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SELECTIONS 



FROM THE 



CHORIC POETRY 



GREEK DRAMATIC WRITERS. 



TRANSLATED INTO ENGLISH VERSE, 

BY 

/ 
J. ANSTICE, B. A. 

PROFESSOR OF CLASSICAL LITERATURE AT KING'S COLLEGE, LONDON, 
AND LATE STUDENT OF CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD. 



LONDON: 

B. FELLOWES, LUDGATE STREET. 

1832. 



^ 



^v 



R, CT.AY, PRINTER, BREA D-STREET-HII.L. 



.ESCH. A GAM. 40. 



ARGUMENT. 

\ 
The capture of Troy having been announced by beacons to 1 
Clytaemnestra at Argos, she commands offerings to be made 
on the altars of all the Gods. The Chorus, consisting of 
Argive old men, still ignorant of the cause of these offer- 
ings, describe the departure of the Grecian armament, 
and affirm the inevitable certainty of Divine Retribution : 
they lament their own unfitness for war ; inquire the mean- 
ing of the sacrificial fires which are kindled ; detail the 
ominous appearance of two Eagles to the Atridse, and the 
interpretation of it given by Calchas, who predicted the 
ultimate success of the expedition ; but warned the chief- 
tains that they would be exposed to the wrath of Diana. 
They address Jove, and reflect on the necessity of moral 
discipline ; relate the detention of the Fleet at Aulis, and 
the consequent sacrifice of Iphigenia by Agamemnon; 
and conclude by expressing their determination to leave to 
Heaven the direction of the event. 



/ESCH. A GAM. 40. 



Nine weary years are more than spent, 
Since royal Menelaus went, 
On fatal suit with Priam bent, 
And Agamemnon's armament 

Joined to redress his wrong ; 
Atridae both, and each a King 
From Jove his throne inheriting, 
A thousand proud ships mustering, 

They led the martial throng : 
Screaming havoc from afar, 
Eager flew the chiefs to war. 

So, when bereaved the vultures ply 
Their oary x wings athwart the sky, 



( l ) The different nautical systems of the ancients and moderns 
have caused a difference in their expressions, when a body passing 
through the air is compared to a vessel cleaving the water. Among 
the ancients, the motion of the wings of a bird is illustrated in 
general by that of oars ; while modern poets generally liken it to 
that of sails. Thus Spenser, Faery Queene, I. xi. 10. 

" His nagging wings when forth he did display, 
Were like two sails." 

b 2 And 



* .ESCH. AGAM. 

Is heard beneath their piercing cry, 
In circles wheeling as they fly 2 

Their nest above, 
Where, till the plunderer dared intrude, 
They watched and fed their callow brood 

In patient love. 
Those shrilly shrieks of bitter wail 
With Phcebus, Pan, or Jove prevail ; 
The avenging Fury forth they send, 
Those exiled nestlings to befriend, 
True to redress the orphan's wrong, 
Retributive at length, though haply lingering long. 3 



And Milton : 

" A fiery globe 

Of Angels on full sail of wing flew nigh, 
Who on their plumy vans received him soft." 
Par. Reg. IV. 581. 
( 2 ) " The wheeling Kite's wild, solitary cry." 

Keble's Christian Year. 
Compare the following Extract from an Ornithological Tour to 
the Islands of Shetland and Orkney (Magazine of Natural History, 
May 1831) : 

" There are, however, a pair or two of the peregrine falcon 
that repair annually to the island for the purpose of breeding ; 
building in the most inaccessible places, which are only to be 
gained by the best and ablest rocksmen ; and even then it is very 
uncertain if the nest can be discovered ; the old bird always taking 
flight upon the first appearance of danger, and wheeling in circles 
over the fowler's head, uttering at intervals the peculiar cry of the 
falcon tribe, which she continues to do until he leaves the crags." 

( 3 ) Compare the ancient proverb, " The mill of God grinds late, 
but grinds to powder ;" and the well-known lines of Horace, 
" Raro antecedentem scelestum 
Deseruit pede Poena Claudo."— Carm. III. 2. 31. 

The 



MUCH. AG AM. 

Thus Jove, whose guardian eye on earth 
Protects the hospitable hearth, 
The crime of Paris to pursue, 
Hath bid the Atridae lead their crew : 
And, while they claim, mid war's alarms, 
A faithless woman's oft-wooed charms, 
To either troop his laws ordain 
Wrestlings and weariness and pain, 
The toil-bowed limb, the shivered lance, 
When warriors to the charge advance, 
Or rest, to stem the foeman's thrust, 
Their fainting knees in Trojan dust. 



The flying sinner, doomed to woe, 

The Fury still can trace ; 
Though limping be her step and slow, 
She will not quit the chase. 
See also a very curious passage in the Choephorae of iEschylus, 
which would be still more valuable if the proper reading could be 
throughout accurately ascertained: that here given is Professor 
Scholefield's, which is however by no means satisfactory. 

e0t7e 5' iv imix% X f P 0S ^t^tv/xos 
Albs Kopa — Ai/cow 8e viv 

irpo(Tayopevo/u.€i/ 
fiporol rvxovres KaAws — 
6\e6piov irveovs* ev ixdpois kotou' 
Toivirep b Aortas, 6 TIapvdaios, 
fxeyav ex wv H- V X^ V X6° V0S > ^X^P°^ vat/ > 
a8oAu)s doAiav, 
fihaTrTOfAtvau, XP° VI<T ~ 
Qe7(ruv, eiroixcTCH. 

Kpa.TSlTO.1 7TC0S TO QtlOV TTapOL TO flT) 

virovpyeiv KO.KOIS. 

Daughter of Jove, with certain hand, 
Fell Justice wields the fatal brand ; 

(Such 



b /ESCH. AGAM. 

The present hour alone we see, 
The future's shaped by Fate's decree. 
Ye in secret tears may pine, 

Vain the suppliant sob of grief ; 
Ye may pour the sparkling wine, 
Shall libations yield relief? 
Not thus appeased the anger dies, 
That waits on slighted sacrifice. 4 

Withered age was little prized ; 
Chiefs our worthless aid despised ; 
All unmeet for warlike toil, 
We were left on Argive soil, 

(Such title meet by men is given, 
To designate that maid of heaven) 
Upon her foes her blasting breath 
She sheds, the minister of death. 
The God, whose steps Parnassus bless, 
Or tread the mighty cave's recess, 

Bids her go forth to slay ; 
Limping and lingering long, but sure, 
And wily, though for purpose pure ; 
Not hospitality can lure 

The huntress from her prey. 
E'en the Divinity we find 
Compelled by strange, superior sway, 
Mysterious mandates, that can bind 
E'en Gods to own them and obey. 
They dare not sinners to befriend, 
Nor sheltering aid to foul transgressors lend. 
( 4 ) This interpretation seems sufficiently established by the Bishop 
of London ; that adopted by Professor Scholefield and some other 
commentators may be thus rendered : 

Not thus are soothed the sisters dire, 
Whose altars never gleam with fire. 



.ESCH. agam. / 

There, with feebleness opprest, 
On the friendly staff to rest. 
Childhood's strength alone is ours ; 
Ere expand the youthful powers, 
Shrined within the bosom's cell 
Mars will never deign to dwell. 
When the leaf of life is sere, 5 
Age as weakly wields the spear, 

< 5 ) " My way of life 

Is fallen into the sere, the yellow leaf." 

Shakspeare. Macbeth. 
" What cold again is able to restore 
My fresh greene yeares, that wither thus and fade ? " 

Lord Surrey. 
As the decline of life is here compared to the withering of the 
leaf in autumn, so in Homer is the passing away of generations to 
its fall in winter : 

0177 7re P (pvKkbiv yever], rotrjSe kuX avdpuu. 
cpvWa ra fjLev t aue/mos xajUoSts x e6 '> a\ha Se 6' vXrj 
Tr]\e06(i)CFa <pvei* eapos 6° imyiyveTai ftpy. 
&s audpwv yeverj, 77 fxhv (pvei, t) 8' d7roA?J7et. 
As that of leaves upon the tree, 
Such is thy course, Humanity ! 
The leaves — on earth the blast strews some, — 
The budding wood bids others come ; 
New life the spring-tide hour supplies, 
And sees a second race arise : 
So are man's generations fleeting, 
And one is born, while one's retreating. 
The same simile occurs in the following passage from the Medita- 
tions Poetiques of Lamartine : 

" Mais toujours repasser par une meme route, 
Voir ses jours epuises s'ecouler goutte a goutte; 
Mais suivre pas a pas dans l'immense troupeau, 
Ces generations, inutile fardeau, 
Qui meurent pour mourir, qui vecurent pour vivre, 
Et dont chaque printems la terre se delivre, 

Comme 



,ESCH. AGAM. 



Age, no more in battle strong, 
Creeps on borrowed stay along, 6 



Comme dans nos forets, le chene avec mepris, 
Livre aux vents des hivers ses feuillages fletris ; 
Sans regrets, sans espoir, avancer dans la vie, 
Comme un vaisseau qui dort sur une onde assoupie ; 
Sentir son ame usee en impuissant effort, 
Se ronger lentement sous la rouille du sort ; 
Penser sans decouvrir, aspirer sans atteindre, 
Briller sans eclairer, et palir sans s'eteindre r 
H^las ! tel est mon sort et celui des humains." 

Along the self-same track for aye to stray, 
To see one's days waste drop by drop away, 
To follow, step by step, the countless train 
Of generations burdening earth in vain, 
Who live but to exist, who die to rest, 
Of whom, each spring, earth rids her weary breast, 
E'en as the forest oak disdainful casts 
His withered foliage to the wintry blasts, 
Onward without regret or hope to creep, 
Like vessel slumbering on a drowsy deep, 
To feel one's spirit toil, yet nought advance, 
Corroded slowly by the rust of chance, 
Muse, but not solve, aspire, but ever fail, 
A ray not clear when bright, nor quenched though pale, — 
This lot, not I alone, but all mankind must wail. 

( 6 ) Literally, " on three feet/' So Sackville, in his description 
of old age : 

" Crooke-backt he was, tooth-shaken and blear-eyed, 
Went on three feet, and sometimes crept on fower — " 

Induction to the Mirror of Magistrates. 

The allusion is to the riddle proposed by the Sphynx to the inha- 
bitants of Thebes, and solved by CEdipus : 

^Eort Siirovv eVt yrjs ku\ virpamov, ov /xiu (pcav}), 
nal rpiirov' aWaaaei Se (pvty fiovov, '6aa eVi ycuav 
epirera Kiveirai, avd r aldepa kcu Kara ttovtov. 
aAA' biroruv irteiffrouriv iireiyojJLei'oi' iroal Qaivr), 
ivQu. rdxos yvloiaiv a<pavpoTwrov ir4\€i auToD. 

There 



.ESCH. AGAM. 



Doting in its last decay, 

Shadowy dream that stalks by day. 7 



There is a creature, wont to go 

Upon four feet, and three, and two, 

Its cry in every state the same. 

Can earth, or air, or ocean name, 

From every kind that through them ranges, 

A single one that, like this, changes 1 

To make the prodigy complete, 

'Tis slowest when it has most feet. 

THE ANSWER. 

KKvOl, Kal ovk ideXovcra, Kanoirrepe Movcra Qavovrwv, 

(pcourjs rjfxerepris gov rehos a/j.irAaKtr}S. 
IxvOpwirov /caTe\e£as, os, r\viKa. ya?uv icpepirei, 

trpSnov ecpv rerpdirovs vr\inos e/c XayovwV 
yripaAeos 5e ireXcap, rpiraTov 7ro5a, Pdicrpov epet5e<, 

avx^va (popTlfav, yf)pu'C Kafi-KTo^vos. 

List, Muse of evil pinion, 

Unwilling, while I tell, 
That fallen is thy dominion ; 

I can thy riddle spell. 
On man thy mind was musing, 

Who, ere erect he stands, 
Crawls on earth's bosom, using 

As feet his tiny hands. 
Age, bowed with years and sorrows, 

His limbs on staff must stay ; 
Another foot he borrows 

To aid him on his way. 

( 7 ) In Eurip. Phcen. 1531. GEdipus replies to Antigone ; 

Tt (x, w irapdive, PaKTpevfiao't tv- 

(pAov iroBos ££dyayes ets cpcos 

\€XVPV o~Korici)V e/c Qakd[xo)v 

omrpoTdroicriu dafcpvoHrtv, 

ttoXiov alOepos t v a.<pav\s s1Z<a\ov, rj. 

vzkvv ZvepQsv, % 

tttuvov ovtipov ;. 

Why 



10 ,£SCH. agam. 

Say, Clytaemnestra, wherefore thus, 
Thou queenly child of Tyndarus, 
Moved by what recent voice of fame, 
Thy Heralds bid the altars flame ? 
On every shrine their gifts bestow 
Of Gods above us and below, 
Who dwell beyond our mortal ken, 
Or mingle in the haunts of men, 
And ever stretch their sheltering arm, 
Our city to protect from harm ? 
From each to each the signal spreads, 
The welkin flashes o'er our heads 

With fires that mount in turn ; 
Long hath in regal cells been stored 
The incense pure, now gently poured, 

To bid them clearly burn. 
Oh ! if thou mayst the tale declare, 
Why thus the kindled altars glare, 

Restore my soul to rest ; 
Now bodes it ill, now Hope's fond smile 
Bids heart-corroding cares awhile 

Be banished from my breast. 



Why hast thou called me forth to day, 
While ill these darkling steps I stay? 
Why summoned me, with wail of woe, 
From murky cell and pallet low ? 
With time and grief my hair is white; 
Like airy ghost that mocks the sight 
This weary, withered form must seem, 
Or pallid corpse, or winged dream. 



.ESCH\ AGAM. 11 

List, while the favouring sign I tell, 
That erst our journeying host befell, 

Its leaders sent to cheer ; 
For still my years can strength supply 
For breath of heaven-taught poesy, 

Congenial art and dear. 

Severed in empire, one in soul, 

And swaying Greece with joint controul, 

Forth are the Atridae gone ; 
And many a spear and hand of might 
Is marshalled with them for the fight; 

Nor these are there alone; 
The bird is nigh of rapid pinion, 
The Eagle, 8 to whose proud dominion 

Quail all the fowls that fly; 



( s ) In Chaucer's Assembly of Fowls, the Goddess Nature, in 
addressing the birds, speaks of 

" The tercell Egle, as ye know full well, 
The foule royall, above you all in degre." 

See also Massinger : 

" Queen of the inhabitants of the air, 
The Eagle that bears thunder on her wings." 

Great Duke of Florence. Act IV. Sc. 2. 

In Dunbar's Rose and Thistle, Kind or Nature is represented 
as crowning the Eagle, King of Birds. 

The origin of the supremacy of the Eagle is thus related by 
Myro.— (Ed. Giles.) 

Zeus 5' ap evl Kprjrr] rpecpero [J.4yas, ovd' apa rts viv 

r}7]8ei ixuKapooi/' 6 §' ae£eTO Tract iWeAetrcri, 

rbv uhv apa rpyponves vtto ^aOew rpecpov avrpw, 

afiPpoatai' 



12 ^ESCH. AGAM. 

Before the rulers of the fleet 
Conspicuous sit, an emblem meet, 

Twin rulers of the sky. 
One is jet black; — a circlet pale 
Surrounds his fellow's spreading tail 

With plumes of silvery hue ; 
Their prey between their claws they tear, 
The quarry is a pregnant hare, 

That, as it ran, they slew ; 
And many a mangled young one died, 
Torn from its teeming mother's side : 



a/xfipoalav (popiovffai an 'tiiceavolo pouwv. 
vetcrap 5' e/c irerpas p.£yas alerbs aikv acpvaffoov, 
ya/JLcprjArj (popeeffKe irorbv Ait firfTioevTi. 
rbv kcu, vucr)(ras irarepa Kpovov, evpvoira Zeus 
aQ6.va.TOV Tro'iyae, kcu ovpavc? iyKarevucrffeV 
wj 5' avrws rprjpoocri ireXeidcriv tiiraae rifxav, 
at 5^ toi depeos Kal xelfxaros ayyeXoi elffi. 

Within the Cretan cavern's shade 
The infant heir of heaven was laid; 

No God the secret knew; 
There waxed in strength each hoyish limb ; 
From ocean's streams, the doves for him 

With sweet ambrosia flew. 
The mighty eagle nectar quaffed 
From some tall cliff, and bore the draught) 

His vigour to renew. 
When Saturn fell, on that proud bird 
Jove immortality conferred, 

And to the skies translated; 
The doves, though still confined below, 

His heralds he created; 
And bade them by their wanderings show 

Whence seasons should be dated. 



^ESCH. AGAM. 13 

Hard by the halls of regal state, 
Upon the spear- hand perched they wait. 
Greece awhile must weep and wail ; 9 
May the right at last prevail ! 
The Seer upon the Atridse turns ; 
With glance prophetic he discerns 

The vision's import clear ; 
The Eagles, by their varying tint, 
He deems of either chieftain hint 

The different character. 
Then thus he speaks : " The host you lead 
" Shall against Priam's town succeed, 

" In heaven's appointed hour; 



( 9 ) In the original it is, " Sing ah ! Linus ! ah ! Linus ! but may 
the good prevail." Linus is said to have been a son of Urania, 
who was torn in pieces by shepherds' dogs ; his fate was a 
constant theme of lamentation ; and the expression atXtvov, 
aiXivou, Ah ! Linus ! ah ! Linus ! which was probably the burden 
of his dirge, was used proverbially to designate any melancholy 
song. He is mentioned in a fragment of Hesiod : 

Ovpuvit] y dp' €tikt€ Aivov iroXvrjparov vlov, 
ov 877 '6<roi (ipoTot elcriv aoidol kcu KiOapicrral 
iravres fxkv dpT]vov(Tiv iv slXairivcus re x n P°? s Te > 
apx6/J.€yoL 5e Aiuov kcu X^yovres KaXeovai. 

On Linus erst Urania smiled, 
Fair mother of a lovely child ; 
But now alone to him belong 
The bard's lament, the minstrel's song; 
Where dance and feast are sparkling gay, 
His is the melancholy lay ; 
Ere they begin, and when they close, 
They call on Linus' name, they tell of Linus' woes. 



14 iESCH. AGAM. 

" But first must Fate the treasures drain, 
" Now stored throughout your rich domain 

"In many an ancient tower. 
" Yet tremble, lest some God should frown, 
" While on your army gazing down ; 

" For scarce may Dian love, 
" Though Ilion's curb, the proud array 
" Of those whose types are birds of prey, 

" The winged hounds of Jove ; 
" She for the timid hare will mourn, 
" Slain with its litter yet unborn ; 
" She guards the offspring of the wood, 
" She loathes the Eagle's feast of blood. 
" Greece awhile must weep and wail ; 
" May the right at last prevail. 
" Since fair Diana lends her help, 
" To shield the Lion's tender whelp, 

" The suckling cub to save ; 
" Since all she tends with fostering care, 
" That make amid the fields their lair, 

" Meekly her pardon crave ! 
" May she avert whate'er of ill 
" Those birds forebode ! — may she fulfil 

" The blessings they portend ! 
" Apollo! let thine accents plead, 
" And with thy sister intercede 

"No adverse blast to send. 
" I tremble, lest her wrath detain 
" Our fleet from bounding o'er the main, 



ESCIL AGAM. 15 

" And lawless sacrifice ordain, 
" Not for the festal banquet slain, 

" But fraught with other doom, 
" Artificer of kindred strife, 
" And severing from her Lord the wife, 

" And bidding Vengeance come. 
" Wrath for a slaughtered child shall yearn, 

" And mindful still, in after time, 
" Rebounding, shall destroy in turn 

" The author of the crime; 
" And, Mistress of the dome, prepare 
To quench her fierce desire, to lay her deep- 
planned snare 1 " 

Such the ills by Fate foreshown, 
From its winged heralds known, 
Doomed in future hour to fall, 
Argos, on thy monarch's hall, 
Mixed with blessings' choicest store, 
Calchas prophesied of yore. 
We his fears and hopes will share, 
Pour the dirge, yet breathe the prayer, 
" Greece awhile must weep and wail ; 
" May the right at last prevail." 

Jove ! the race that dwell below, 
Little of thy nature know ; 
Yet if thou wilt list to us, 
Willing that we name thee thus, 



16 .ESCH. AGAM. 

Soothe my soul, that, pondering well, 
Deems that none save thee can tell, 
If securely it may throw 
From its thoughts the load of woe. 
He 10 , whose emblem well might be 
Springing fount, or budding tree, 



( ,0 ) This is not the only passage in iEschylus, in which he refers 
to the dynasties which had preceded that of Jove ; in the Pro- 
metheus, the hero replies to Mercury, who had been sent to him 
from Jove : 

Neov veoi Kparetre, /ecu §o/ce?T6 877 

valeiv airevdrj Trepyafi ' ouk 4k roovS' iyk 

Sicrcrovs rvpdvvovs e/CTrecrcWas ^crdofMrfu ; 

rpirov Se tov vvv Koipavovvr iirorpoixou 

atax^crra ical tox'ctto. 

Youthful, and young in power, ye think forsooth 

To dwell unscathed within heaven's battlements ; 

Have I not seen two Tyrants thence cast down ? 

I shall behold the third, who now is Lord, 

Meet with a quicker and a fouler fall ! 
It seems universally allowed, that the dynasty immediately pre- 
ceding that of Jove, was Saturn's : who was expelled by Saturn is 
a point less agreed on ; some say that Uranus and Ge (Heaven 
and Earth) first ruled ; others ascribe original dominion to Ophion 
and Eurynome ; in allusion to this tradition, Milton says of the 
fallen Angels : 

" Some tradition they dispersed 

Among the heathen, of their purchase got, 

And fabled how the Serpent, whom they call 

Ophion, with Eurynome, the wide 

Encroaching Eve perhaps, had first the rule 

Of high Olympus, thence by Saturn driven, 

And Ops, ere yet Dictcean Jove was born." 

Par. Lost. X. 578, 
This is the Mythology of Apollonius Ithodius : 
v HetSei/ S 3 ods irp&TOv 'Ocplav Evpwo/XT] re 

'Djceavls VKpoevros %X (,V xparos OvAvfnroio. 



/ESCH. AGAM. 17 

Bold in battle, Lord of Heaven, 
From his starry throne was driven : 
Once he was ; now past away, 
Hushed his boast, and sunk his sway. 
He, who next on high was set, 
Found a rival stronger yet ; 
In the wrestling overthrown 
Saturn's dynasty is gone. 
Wisest he, who hymns to thee, 
Jove, the song of victory ! 
Thou to Wisdom's fair abode 
Leadest man thy rugged road, 
Till he own thy wholesome rule : 
All must learn in suffering's school. 



fiJcrre fitrj kcu xepcrli/, 6 j.i\v Kpovcp et/ca0e Tifirjs, 
T] Be Vey' Zirecrov 8' eVi Kvjxaaiv 'Clueavolo. 
oi Se reus [laKapeaai 8eo7s TiTrjaiv avacrcrov, 
6<ppa Zeus en Kovpos eVi (ppeal vijiria etScbs 
Aiktcuov vaUcrKeu viro aireos. 

First (they sung) Ophion's own 
Was Olympus' starry throne; 
Daughter of the azure sea, 
Shared his sway Eurynome : 
He to Saturn quailed in fight; 
She acknowledged Rhea's might ; 
Ocean to the vanquished gave 
Refuge underneath his wave. 
To the victor's bidding proud, 
Titans, happy spirits, bowed; 
'Neath Dictoean cavern's shade, 
Jove, an infant yet, was laid, 
Ere his childhood caught the gleam 
Of Ambition's after-dream. 



18 JESCH. AGAM. 

E'en in sleep, pangs felt before, 
Treasured long in memory's store, 
Bring in visions back their pain, 
Melt into the heart again, 
By its crossed affections taught 
Chastened will and sobered thought : 
Thus is man, by sorrow's rod, 
Forced to bow his pride to God. 

The Leader of the Grecian fleet, 

Thus by experience taught, resigned 
His will to Fortune's stroke unkind, 

Nor blamed the prescient Sage ; 
With Fate unable to compete, 

He calmed his stormy rage : 
While, gazing oft where Chalcis stood 
Across the frequent-ebbing flood, 

The host in Aulis lay : 
Ignoble leisure loathed the brave ; 
Keen blew those blasts from Strymon's wave, 

That sailors oft dismay, 
That drive the ship from port afar, 
Nor leave unscathed or rope or spar : 
With these pale Famine joined to mar 
The wasting flower of Grecian war. 

But when by that reluctant Seer, 

Who pleaded Dian's will, 

Was taught the remedy of ill 
More than that ill severe, 



jesch. A6AM. 19 

The Atridae heard the fatal sound ; 
They struck their sceptres on the ground, 
The tears they laboured to restrain ~\ 

Gushed forth, and told each hero's pain. > 
First spake the elder of the twain : 
" An evil lot is mine to choose, 
" Hard fate obedience to refuse, 

" Hard fate to slay my child, 
" My home's bright ornament and pride ; 
" 'Twere hard if at the altar's side 
" A Father's hand were crimson dyed, 

" With virgin gore defiled : 
" Still, to whichever part I lean, 
" Is sorrow's threatening aspect seen ! 
" How may I leave my true allies ? 

" How quit the host I lead ? 
" To lay the storm, and calm the skies, 
" They well may claim the sacrifice ; 

" They well may bid her bleed ! " 
He spoke: — to heaven's control he bowed, 
Like veering wind, his spirit proud, 
Soon as fate's harness he had donned, 
Was instant changed to fierce from fond; 
Nor more from passion's blast secure 
Was all that's holy, all that's pure. 
The heart, once plotting foul offence, 

Once lent to evil rede, 
Soon gathers frantic confidence, 

Soon ventures desperate deed: 
c 2 



20 MSCH. AG AM. 

Reason to wildest zeal gave way ; 

He summoned strength his child to slay. 

Victim, to loose his fleet, and aid 

War to avenge a woman made. 

Her piteous cries, her tender age, 

In love with war those chieftains sage 

But lightly recked of there ; 
Her father's self but little heeded 
His own dear name, so softly pleaded, 
But bade them breathe the prayer. 
Like kid they lift her from the ground, 
Her form in flowing drapery wound, 
Her head declining : 
Her features fair around 
In haste the bands they bound, 
Tightened to curb the sound 
Of words repining, 
To bar the bitter thought's egress 
From lips the seat of loveliness, 
Lest from her frantic grief should fall 
A curse upon her Father's hall. 
Her veil, in saffron-coloured flow, 11 
Trailing swept the plain below : 



( u ) If Professor Scbolefield's interpretation be adopted, tli 
original may be tbus rendered : 

. Then while the gory drops distain 
With purple dye the verdant plain. 



ESCII. AG AM. * J 1 

Her pleading eyes shot Pity's dart, 12 
To rankle in each murderer's heart, 
Like form by painter's fancy dreamed, 13 
So pale, so fair, so still she seemed. 
She longed to speak — for well she knew 

Those warriors standing by, 
For them, in days of brighter hue, 

She 'd breathed sweet melody. 
Oft when she saw the brave resort, 
And crowd her Father's princely court, 
When the third cup at festal board l4 
Was crowned to smiling Fortune's lord, 
(Since even bashful maiden may 
Breathe pure affection's simple lay,) 
She loved her Sire to greet with song, 
And honour mid the reveller's throng. 



( la ) So Milton : 

" And from about her shot darts of desire 
Into all eyes." 

Par. Lost. VIII. 62. 
( 13 ) Compare the description of Constance in Marmion : 
" And there she stood so calm and pale, 
That, but her breathing did not fail, 
And motion slight of eye and head, 
And of her bosom, warranted 
That neither sense nor pulse she lacks, 
You might have thought a form of wax, 
Wrought to the very life, were there, 
So still she was, so pale, so fair." 
( u ) The third libation was always offered to Jupiter Soter, and 
was an acknowledgment of prosperity, which was considered as a 
boon resulting from his protection. 



5 iESCH. AGAM. 

What followed then I never saw ; 

Not mine to tell the tale : 
Yet may not Fate's unerring law, 

By Calchas uttered, fail. 
This just decree alone I know ; 
Man must be disciplined by woe. 
To me, whatever of good or ill 
The future brings, since come it will, 
I'll bow my spirit, and be still. 
For why should I forestall my doom, 
And mourn o'er sorrows yet to come ? 
At length, by Fate's fulfilment, clear 
Shall those prophetic words appear: 
Till then, while singly thus we stand, 
The bulwark of our Apian land, 
Still shall my prayers to heaven ascend, 
That doubt in happiness may end. 



yESCH. A GAM. 346. 



ARGUMENT. 

The Chorus, now assured of the capture of Troy, return 
thanks to Jove for having avenged the guilt of Paris, and 
affirm that punishment is always consequent on crime; 
they relate the departure of Helen, and the song of the 
minstrels on her flight, depicting the grief of Menelaus ; — 
describe the sorrows which had been caused throughout 
Greece by the loss of heroes in the Trojan War, and the 
ill-will thence resulting against the Atridae, of whose fall 
they express themselves apprehensive, inasmuch as they 
had caused the slaughter of many, thereby provoking the 
anger of the Gods. They conclude with a prayer that their 
own condition in life may be neither so high as to excite 
envy, nor so abject as to be exposed to insult. 



^SCH. AGAM. 346. 



Praise to thee, eternal King ! 
Thus thy grateful votaries sing. 
And thou, blest Night, whose net was flung 
O'er Ilion's towers, while old and young 

Struggled in vain below, 
Thine were the captive city's spoils, 
In slavery's meshes wrapt, and toils 

Of all-ensnaring woe. 
Meekly my spirit bows to thee, 
Jove, Lord of hospitality ! 

By thee was Retribution sent ; 

By thee at Paris' head 
Long hath the bow been bent ; 
By thee the shaft was sped — 
When the fatal hour was come, 
Meet to execute his doom, 
Thine arrow bounded to its mark aright, 
Nor o'er the stars erroneous winged its flight. 



26 JESCR. AGAM. 

Beneath the stroke of Jove they fell ; 
No idly-fancied tale I tell ; 

The task is mine, 

With eagle eyne 
To track the steps of wrath divine, 

See God fulfil 

His sovereign will, 
Though man may mock his vengeance still. 
There have been, whose rebellious pride 
His righteous judgment has denied, 
Nor owned the Gods in anger scan 
Their worship trodden down by man. 
But banished be the unholy thought, 
The creed by impious Sceptics taught, 
Bold sons of Luxury, who defy 
And challenge thus the powers on high ; 
Whose gorgeous halls their lords elate, 1 
With superfluity of state. 
Mine be the spirit's sober frame, 
That best may heaven's protection claim ; 
The mere exemption from distress 
Is all I ask of happiness ; 



(') If Professor Scbolefield's reading of this very perplexed pas- 
sage be preferred, it may be thus rendered : 

If pampered e'er mid halls of state, 

And overflowing stores, 
The human heart, with pride elate, 
Its bold defiance pours, 
Children too late their parents' crime shall rue, 
And Heaven to death the sinful race pursue. 



.-ESCH. AG AM. 27 

For vainly Wealth's proud bulwarks tower, 
When man, in insolence of power, 
Justice, thy law disdains to know, 
And dares with impious foot thine altar overthrow. 
Oft luring with her dulcet song, 
Temptation's eloquence is strong ; 
Yet, treasured long, the meed of crime 
Shall whelm the wretch in after-time ; 
For vain the toil of human skill 
To quench the lurid star of ill. 
As, when experienced hands explore 
If base alloy pollute the ore, 
The brass, by long attrition tried, 
Placed by the purer metal's side, 
Displays at length the dingy hue, 
That proves its former claim untrue ; 
So Time's discerning hand hath art 
To set the good and ill apart. 
And he who, fleet in pleasure's race, 2 
The bird upon the wing will chase, 



2 If the pursuit of Helen by Paris is intended by tins metaphor, 
a like thought has been more fully expressed in those well- 
known lines of the Giaour : 

" As rising on its purple wing, 
The insect Queen of Eastern spring, 
Through emerald meadows of Cashmere, 
Invites the young pursuer near," &c. 

If, as is probable, the simile extends to the reckless pursuit of 
pleasure generally, it is prettily illustrated by the following Italian 

fable 



28 MSCH. AGAM. 

Soon, for his folly's meed, may moan 
His country's ruin, and his own: 



fable of De Rossi. A child is recalled from the chase of a bird 
by its mother ; 

" E anelante e lassa, alfine, 

Gia del colle sul confine, 

Dice : ' O madre, un vago augello, 

' Che poc' alto ognor dal suolo, 

' D' arboscello in arboscello 

( Dispiegava incerto il volo ; 

' Inseguia ; ch' ogni momento 

' Mi parea con man sicura 

'D' afferrarlo; e quegli al vento 

' Dando 1' ale, a me si fura. 

6 Breve e il vol, ma sempre nuovo, 

' Si che i passi ognor rinnuovo : 

'Ma F augello ognor si svia. 

' Quanto mai, quanto sudore, 

' Ahi ! mi costa, madre mia, . 

' Quell' augello ingannatore !' 

A colei, che irata accusa 

L' augellin che F ha delusa, 

La prudente genitrice 

Pria sorride, e poi le dice, 

' Cara figlia, di que' vanni, 

' Del sudor ch' oggi spargesti, 

' Ah ! col volgere degl' anni 

' II pensier vivo ti resti. 

'Qual tu errasti sconsigliata, 

* Per F augel che t' ha ingannata, 

' Cosi F uomo errando va 

' Per la sua felicita. 

1 Ognor prossima la vede, 

' D' afferrarla ognor si crede ; 

1 Ma colei, spiegando 1' ale, 

' Ad un volo piu lontano, 

1 Corron sempre, e sempre in vano, 

' Fin che guingano i mortali, 

' Tra F inganno e tra la speme, 

' Infelici a Tore estreme.' " 

Dis- 



yESCII. AGAM. 29 



No more his prayers the Gods delay, 
They sweep the reprobate away. 



Disappointed of her game, 

Panting up the hill she came, 

But her story was begun, 

Lre the summit quite she won. 

" Mother ! Mother ! I have been 

" Such a chase across the green, 

" By a cruel bird outwitted, 

" Still from bush to bush it flitted, 

" Rising oft, but soon alighting, 

" Still avoiding, still inviting: 

" Now I thought it all my own, 

" In a moment it was gone : 

" Onward still my steps it drew, 

" Then it spread its wing and flew ; — 

" What a world of pains it cost ! 

" Now the pretty treasure's lost !" 

While the maid her tale repeated, 

Angry to be thus defeated, 

First the prudent mother smiled, 

Then bespoke her pouting child : 

" Let thy chase, my darling, give 

" Lesson to thee how to live. 

" From thine own pursuit and sorrow, 

" From that bird a warning borrow : 

" Rash and headlong, child, like thee, 

" Man pursues felicity. 

" Still illusive prospects cheer him, 

" Still he thinks the treasure near him, 

" When he on the prize would spring, 

" Bliss is ever on the wing ; 

" Thus his weary life he spends 

" In a chase that never ends, 

" Hopes conceived and baffled ever, 

" Bootless quest and vain endeavour." 

See also a little song of Goethe's, entitled Die Freude : 
" Es flattert um die Quelle 
Die wechselnde Libelle, 

Mich 



30 MSCR. AGAM. 

Such was Paris — he, who sought 

The court of Atreus' son ; 
There was his work of treachery wrought, 
There Helen wooed and won ; 
There, holiest laws were cast aside 
By thankless guest and faithless bride. 

Mich freut sie lange schon ; 
Bald dunkel und bald helle, 
Wie der Chamaleon. 

Bald roth, bald blau, 

Bald blau, bald grim, 

O dass ich in der Nahe, 

Doch ihre Farbe sahe ! 

Sie schwirrt und schwebet, rastet nie ! 
Doch still, sie setzt sich an die Weiden. 
Da hab' ich sie ! da hab' ich sie ! 
Und nun betracht' ich sie genau, 
Und seh' ein traurig dunkles Blau. — 
So geht es dir, Zerglied'rer deiner Freuden !" 

Yon dragon-fly, on changeful wing, 

In circles round the crystal spring, 

See fluttering in the sun; 

She mocks my sight; 

Now dark, now bright, 
Like the Chameleon. 
Blushing now with ruddy hue, 
Now a red and now a blue ; 
Now confused and now more clear, 
Might I but behold her near! 
Whirring, flitting', restless thing, 
Will she never fold her wing? 
On the meads she lights at last; — 
Now I hold thee, Captive, fast ! 
Yet no gaudy tints I spy, 
Thou art but a dingy fly ! 
So truth his painted dream destroys, 
Who would anatomize his joys. 



--ESCH. AG AM. 31 

To Sparta's sons a fatal gift, 
A parting legacy she left ; 
The conflicts of the spear and shield, 
The terrors of the battle field, 
The fleet's array ; — and ruin bore 
For dowry to the Trojan shore. 
Daring what none should dare, she sped, 
And passed the gates with hurried tread, 
Then, while aloud their dirges rung, 
'Twas thus the household minstrels sung : 
" Woe for the courts of pride! 

" Woe for the slighted chief ! 
" For haunts, by love once sanctified, 

" Now consecrate to grief! 
" Yet from her injured lord no word 
" Of passion's wild reproach is heard ; 
" Fixed in unconscious trance, his gaze 
" Yet seeks her as in other days, 

" And scarce believes her gone : 
" A shade will seem his halls to sway, 
" So will he pine and waste away, 

" For her o'er ocean flown. 
" No more delighted will he trace 3 
" The sculptured marble's form of grace, 



( 3 ) The original admits also of the following version : 
Nor now delighted will he trace 
Her statue's imitative grace; 
The dull, cold stone may ill supply 
The living richness of her eye. 

The 



k 



32 iESCH. AGAM. 

" His longing eyes lack her: — to him 

" All loveliness beside is dim. 

" Then sorrow's phantom- train appears, 

" An empty joy that leads to tears. 

" The dream, with Fancy's colouring warm, 

" Departs, an unsubstantial form, 

" Glides through the arms that fain would clasp, 

" And mocks the lover's eager grasp ; 

" Then spreads aloft its airy wings, 

" That wait on slumber's wanderings." 



The literal translation is this : " The grace of the fair statues is 
hateful to him, and in poverty of eyes all beauty is departed." 
This is of course ambiguous ; and it is hard to say which inter- 
pretation is the most poetical ; but the one adopted in the text is 
perhaps the best borne out by the phrase in the original. If the 
poverty of eyes be referred to Menelaus, the expression must be 
understood as meaning that they were deprived of their greatest 
treasure, and the idea is illustrated by the lines of Byron: 

" She was his sight; 

For his eyes followed hers, and saw with hers, 
Which coloured all his objects." 

The Dream. 

If the statues in which Menelaus is represented as taking no plea- 
sure are supposed to be those of Helen, the poverty of eyes must 
be understood of the absence of living lustre ; and our own appli- 
cation of the epithet "rich" to eyes throws light on the passage. 
And we may remember that it is the appearance of the eye in the 
supposed statue of Hermione which peculiarly strikes her hus- 
band : 

he. " The fixture of her eye has motion in't, 
As we were mocked with art — " 



Pa. " I'll draw the curtain- 



My Lord's almost so far transported, that 
He'll think anon it moves." 



yESCH. AGAM. 33 

Such domestic sorrows met 

Round the Spartan monarch's hearth : 
Such as these, or darker yet, 

Brood on other spots of earth, 
By their guilty bridal sent: 
All their martial aid who lent, 
Greece, to thy proud armament, 
Left, in halls with grief opprest, 
Tearful eye, and aching breast, 
Love, that, o'er the absent yearning, 
Waits in vain their glad returning; 
For, instead of heroes, home 4 
Vases, ashes only come. 



( 4 ) The whole of the context is well illustrated by the following 
speech in Sophocles. It is that of Electra, on receiving the urn, 
supposed to contain the ashes of Orestes : 

« (pt\Ta.TOU fji.V7iiJ.eiov avOpairoov i/xo\, 
ipvxr)s 'OpeoTOu Xolttov, ws ct cot' iXiriSwv, 
ovx wvTrep i^iireixirov, elcrede^dfxrjv. 
vvv fiev yap ovdhv vvra fiacrrafa %epo?f 
Hofitav Se a, 3) irai, Aafiirpby e|e7re/iT|/' iyu. 
ws &<pz\ov trdpoidev e/cAi7retV fiiov, 
irplv is £evr)v ere yaiav eKirefixpui, x^P ^ 
nXtyacra tcuvSg, navaaooaaaOai cpovov, 
OTTcas Qavwv eKeiao rfj tSO* r)fiepa, 
TVfifSov irarpqiov KOivbv etA^x^ 5 /xepos. 
vvv 8' £ktos olkwv, Kairl yr)s oAAtjs, (pvyas, 
KaKcos cwrcoAoy, ays Ka<nyvf)T7)s Si'xa* 
kovt iv (piAr)(Ti x € §°~ LV V Tahaiv' iyw 
Xovrgois e/c^c/iTjc', ovt€ irajxcpXeKTOv Trvpbs 
dvei\6/j.r]V, us elicbs, &9/\iov fiapos. 
aAA 5 iv £evr)(Ti x*pv i KrjSevdels rd\as, 
o-fxiupbs irpoo-fiKeis uyKos iv cr/xiKpu Kvrei. 
oX /J.OI TaKaiva ttjs ifxris iraAai rpo(p7)s 

D avw<pehr)Tov, 



34 MSCH. AGAM. 

And Mars, who traffics with the slain, 
Whose hands the doubtful scale sustain, 



ava><peAr)Tov, ttjv iyoo dap.' <x,u<j[>t aol 
irov(f yAvKe? irapecrx ov ' ovtg yap ttots 
H7)Tpbs (rv y' i\o~Qa fxaWov $ Ka.fj.ov <pl\os' 
oftd' ot tear oJkov fiauv, aAA' syk rpocp6s' 
eycc 8' aSeAd)^ ffol 7rpoar]vdwfJ.T]V act. 
vvv 8' eKAeAorrre toJUt' eV rj/xepa puS. 
6av6ura avu o~ol. iravra yap ^vuapndaas, 
QiieAA* '6iroos, /BefSrjKas' of^eTaj Trar^p' 
T^OvrjK iyoo aoi. (ppovBos avrbs el davcov. 
yeAwcri 8' 4x&poi fiaiuerai 8' v<p? rjSovris 
fi^Trip ajurjrap, ?)S ifjiol o~v TroAkdicis 
(p^fxas KaQpa irpovire/xTres, ws tpavov/xevos 
rifxcopos uvt6s. aAAa ravQ' b dvcrrvxys 
Sat/now 6 cros re Kapi.os e£a</>eiAeTo, 
os a a)Se (J.OL Trpovwep-tpev, aurl <pi\TaT7]S 
fiopcprjs, airodoy re KaX cKiav avuxptArj. 

O sole memorial that my love retains, 

My doting love, a brother's dear remains ! 

How fade the hopes with which I saw thee part, 

And fondly whispered comfort to my heart! 

Then light and joy about thy pathway shone ; 

'Tis nothing now round which my arms are thrown. 

Oh ! had I slept in death, before my hand 

Snatched thee from fate and sent to foreign strand ! 

Thine in that hour had been a gentler doom, 

Thine, sacred slumber in thy father's tomb. 

But now from home afar 'twas thine to die, 

And heave in banishment thy latest sigh. 

No sister sought thine anguish to beguile, 

Decked thy pale corpse, nor, from the expiring pile, 

A mournful load, thy funeral vase conveyed : 

By foreign hands the wonted rites were paid, 

By strangers borne, I see thy dust return, 

A little burden in a little urn. 

Was it for this I watched thine infant charms, 

And blessed thee, while thy weight fatigued mine arms ? 

For 



/ESCH. AGAM. 35 

When spears are met in fight, 
When funeral flames have ceased to burn, 
W T ith air-light ashes fills the urn, 

Sole relics left of might. 
The bitter tears that weep the dead, 
In anguish o'er that dust are shed 

From many a kinsman's eye ; 
And one they praise, as " skilled in strife," 
And one, that " reckless of his life, 
" He, for another's faithless wife, 

" Died fighting gallantly." 
Not all declared, nor all concealed, 
Half is the bosom's thought revealed, 
And murmurs are in secret spread, 
That light on the Atridae's head. 



For ne'er thy mother's love exceeded mine, 
Nor I to menials would my charge resign. 
Oft to mine ear the welcome accents came, 
When thy fond lips invoked thy sister's name : 
Now in one fatal moment all is flown, 
And even memory's pleasures with thee gone ; 
Thy fate, like tempest, o'er my spirit past, 
And all my joys were swept before the blast. 
My sire is gone ; and thou hast ceased to be ; 
And I, though living deemed, expire in thee. 
My foes deride ; in exultation wild, 
My mother triumphs o'er her slaughtered child; 
No mother she ! — How oft from thee I heard 
Promise of vengeance, all too long deferred : 
Our evil Genius stayed thy bright career, 
And now in mockery sends thy relics here, 
Relics that ill my brother's place supply, 
While airy ashes meet my longing eye. 
d 2 



86 /ESCH. AGAM. 

For not beneath their native sky 
May Graecia's comely warriors lie ; 
Where erst the Trojan ramparts frowned, 
Her mighty sleep in hostile ground. 
At home, sedition's voice is known 
By sullen, discontented tone, 
Whose muttered threatenings record 
A people's curse against their Lord. 

Waits my soul in racking fear, 
That which night conceals to hear. 
For those, by whom are many slain, 
The Gods all-seeing mark : 
In time the Furies dark 
Turn them from Fortune's height again, 
Since not by virtue's aid they gained the steep, 
In lone obscurity to weep, 
For aye amid the ruined left, 
Of aid alike and hope bereft. 

Ask not for too bright a name, 
Crave not too surpassing fame, 
For on the proud descends the bolt of heaven, 
And, launched against their eyes, Jove's thunderbolt 
is driven. 
Ne'er fixed on me be envy's gaze, 
Not mine a city's walls to raze, 
To sway, a conqueror, or, a captive, pine ; 
A gentler lot than these, life's happy mean, be mine. 






iESCH. A GAM. 664. 



THE ARGUMENT. 

The Chorus allude to the name of Helen, expressive (in 
Greek) of the evils she had caused. They draw a parallel 
between the joy her arrival at Troy had excited, and the 
sorrow resulting from its consequences ; and exemplify it 
by the pleasure derived from the early playfulness, and the 
pain produced by the subsequent ravages of a young lion, 
which had been brought up as a domestic animal. They 
affirm that it was the guilt of Paris and Helen, not the 
prosperity of Troy, which caused the destruction of that 
city, though they allow that virtue is more frequently found 
in a lowly than an exalted station. 



/ESCH. AGAM. 664. 



Helen! who, in early youth, 
Named thee with too perfect truth ? 
Was it not, from starry sphere, 
Some viewless spirit lingering near, 
Bade thy virgin title be 
Matched with thy dark destiny ? l 



(') Puns on names were not considered by the Greek tragedians 
inconsistent with the dignity of tragedy. In the plays of Euri- 
pides, especially, they abound : and they have been admitted by 
our own most admired authors. Thus Massinger : 
" Thy name is Angelo, 
And like that name thou art." 

The Virgin Martyr. Act II. Sc. 1. 
And Shakspeare : 

" Admirable Miranda, 
Nay even the top of admiration." 

The Tempest. Act III. Sc. 1. 

And the Nun in Chaucer says of Saint Cecilia, that 
" For pure chastnesse of virginitee, 
Or for she whiteness had of honestee, 
And grene of conscience, and of good fame 
The swote savour, Lilie was hire name." 

Canterbury Tales, 15556. 

Two 



40 JESCH. AGAM. 

Helen, wooed by warrior's spear, 
Widow's curse, and orphan's tear, 
Let thy name thy story tell : 
Thou, who, like a yawning Hell, 
In the abyss hast swallowed down 
Fleet and phalanx, tower and town ! 

From her richly-woven tent, 
Forth, a faithless Bride, she went, 
While, to waft her parting sail, 
Earth-born Zephyr lent his gale. 
Trackless passed the bounding bark 
O'er the ocean's bosom dark: 
Seeking for its wake in vain, 
Came the fell pursuing train. 
Many a shield the hunters bore, 
Chasing those, whose dashing oar 
Rested, where the leaf-crowned wood 
Nods o'er Simoi's' silver flood : 
With the hue of slaughter dyed, 
Strife the venturous vessels plied. 

Helen's coming well fulfilled 

All that mighty Wrath hath willed, 



Two other etymologies are then proposed of the saint's name, from 
heven and lia, and heven and leos, and both justified by an appeal 
to her character. Helen, in Greek, may be conceived to signify 
the destroyer, though the etymology is ratber forced. The trans- 
lation here given has do pretensions to originality. 



jESCH. agam. il 

When thy turrets, Troy, she sought, 
Dearly loved, but dearly bought ! 2 
Long treasured, late hath burst on thee 

Dark vengeance from above, 
For broken hospitality, 

And desolated love ; 
And Jove, who, throned on high, 

Guards fire-side bliss below, 
Hath changed thy bridal melody 

To funeral notes of woe. 
Free swelled the chaunt, when, mid thy proud array, 
Her new-found kindred poured the hymeneal lay. 

Other strains, for sorrow meet, 

Ring through Priam's crumbling street ; 

O'er her sons untimely dead, 

Hath that ancient city shed 

Many a tear ; and clasped in vain 

Warrior-sons in battle slain, 

And, taught to loathe the bridal song, 

Mourned Paris' hapless wedlock long. 

He, who the Lion's whelp hath nurst 3 

At home, with fostering hand, 
Finds it a gentle thing at first, 

Obedient to command ; 



( 2 ) This is also intended to convey a pun in the original ; the 
same word signifying wedlock and woe. 

( 3 ) A parallel passage occurs in Sir Walter Scott's "Abbot;" 

the 



42 iESCH. AGAM. 

Amid the playful children sporting, 
The aged Sire's caresses courting, 
Like infant, clasped in fond embrace. 
Rubbing against the hand its face, 

And fawning for its food : 
Soon, other instincts may he trace, 
The heirloom of its savage race, 

Its native thirst for blood. 
Requiting ill its master's care, 
It banquets on forbidden fare, 
On many a fleecy flock it falls, 
Its rage the vassal train appals, 

With gore the chambers flow ; 
It ranges through the desolate halls, 

Grim minister of woe ! 

Bride of Paris, such art thou ! 
To Ilion when thy venturous prow 
First bore thee o'er the ocean brine, 
What melting loveliness was thine ! 



the words are addressed by Henry Warden to the Lady of Avenel 
on the subject of Roland Graeme : " You have brought into your 
bower a lion's cub; delighted with the beauty of his fur, and the 
grace of his gambols, you have bound him with no fetters befitting 
the fierceness of his disposition. You have let him grow up as 
unawed as if he had been still a tenant of the forest, and now you 
are surprised and call out for assistance when he begins to rend, 
and tear, according to his proper nature." (The Abbot, Chap. III.) 
Wellauer has been followed in the application of this simile to 
Helen instead of Paris. 



,ESCH. AGAM. l>» 

A spirit like the breathless calm, 1 
When summer's gentle air is balm ; 
Eyes, darting many a tender glance, 
An unassuming elegance, 
Whose quiet charms new beauty lent 5 
To grace each costly ornament ; 
Love's very flower, whose bloom invites, 
Yet stings the gazer it delights. 6 — 



( 4 ) Compare Shakspeare : 

" They are as gentle 
As zephyrs, blowing below the violet, 
Not wagging his sweet head." 

Cymbeline. Act IV. Sc. 2. 

( 5 J The original words, anaanouov ayaX/xa ttKovtov, mean " a 
quiet ornament of wealth." These may imply nothing more than 
that Helen was modest amid the magnificence of her apparel ; 
and " the ornament of wealth" must then be considered as a peri- 
phrasis for " costly array ;" but the expression seems more poeti- 
cal, if understood to convey the idea, that her quiet charms set off 
the queenly dress she bore. Compare Massinger : 
Fiorinda. " How does this dressing show ? 
Calaminta. 'Tis of itself 

Curious and rare— but borrowing ornament, 

As it does from your grace that deigns to wear it, 

Incomparable." 

The Great Duke of Florence. Act II. Sc. 1. 
( 6 ) Literally, " eating the soul." The word Scckvcc, however, 
perhaps more commonly expresses the sudden infliction of a 
wound,, than a constant and gradual gnawing. If this be true in 
the present instance, the passage may be illustrated by the follow- 
ing lines from Chaucer : 

" He cast his eyen upon Emelia, 
And therewithal he blent and cried ah I 
As though he stongen were unto the herte." 

Palamon and Arcite. 1070. 



44 ^SCH. AGAM. 

Soon was the blissful promise past! 
Bitter thy wedlock's fruit at last; 
Evil the day that saw thee come, 
Inmate of Priam's peaceful home, 
Sent by avenging Heaven's decree, 
A Fury, not a Bride, to be ! 

Falsely, I ween, the Sages told, 
In parables they framed of old, 
That glad success and fortune high 
Beget a fatal progeny. 
They sung, that, in the destined hour, 

To all who reign below, 
Spring, from the ancient stem of power, 

Unfailing shoots of woe. 
I stand alone, yet heed them not, 

For ne'er to righteous halls, 
Though wealth adorn their master's lot, 

Such evil offspring falls. 
'Tis guilt alone that teems with sorrow, 7 
Who from her mother's hue her sombre tint doth 
borrow, 



( 7 J This reminds us of Milton's celebrated Allegory, (Par. Lost. 
II. 648,) in which he makes Sin the parent of Death, according to 
the expression of St, James, (i. 15.) " Sin, when it is finished, 
bringeth forth death." And the present passage is still more fully 
illustrated by one which Mr. Todd, in his note on Milton's lines, 
quotes from Latimer's Sermons : " Then came in Death and Hell ; 
Sinne was their mother. Therefore they must have such an image 
as their mother Sinne would give them." Tins is a curious in- 

instancc 






yESCH. AG AM. 45 

And ancient deeds of bold offence 
Bring forth in other days fresh acts of violence ! 

Or soon or late, in heaven's appointed time, 
Awakes the wrathful child of crime, 
Spirit, by prowess uncontrolled, 
In all unholy carnage bold, 
Nurtured in murky courts of strife, 
Foul as the form that gave it life. 

'Tis true that Justice oft is found, 

The smoke-dimmed cottage walls around 

Shedding her purest light ; 
From gilded palaces, where gain 
Leaves on its master's hand a stain, 
She speeds her holy flight, 
Disdainful stalking by, 
In sullen majesty, 
Nor smiles on wealth that bears thy stamp, Iniquity ! 

But casts the counterfeit away, 
True to her task, each deed with meet reward to pay. 



stance of the superiority of JEschylus to his contemporaries in his 
moral views. The opinion from which he expresses his dissent, 
that greatness, independent of conduct, provokes the envy and 
vengeance of the Gods, is frequent in the Greek writers, and 
especially in Herodotus. 



^ESCH. CHOEPH. 20. 



THE ARGUMENT. 

An ominous vision having appeared to Clytaemnestra after the 
death of Agamemnon, she sends the Chorus, consisting of 
captive maidens, with libations, in hopes of averting the 
portended evil. In this Ode they lament their miserable 
condition, describe the horrible nature of the dream, and 
express their own unwillingness to offer gifts which must 
be ineffectual to atone for murder. They proceed to be- 
wail the house of Agamemnon, and accuse the citizens of 
cowardice in submitting to JEgisthus, but confidently anti- 
cipate his fall, since crime is never ultimately unpunished. 
They conclude with bewailing the necessity laid upon them 
of concealing their sentiments. 



.ESCH. CHOEPH. 20. 



Obedient to my Queen's command, 
With pure libations in my hand, 

The regal halls I leave: 
The shredded robe, the oft-dealt blow, 
The bleeding cheek, whose furrows show 
The handy-work of frantic woe, 

Bear witness how I grieve. 

Torn is the linen vest, 

That veiled my snowy breast ; 
And smiles around my lips no longer play ; 

My heart, with care opprest, 
Is fed on agony from day to day. 

A cry the calm of midnight broke ; 
From the dark chambers Terror spoke ; 
Troubler of sleep! — with ghastly stare, 
With breath of wrath, and bristling hair, 
And accent shrill that pierced the ear, 
Loud raved the dream-inspiring Seer ! 



50 JESCH. CHOEPH. 

Right heavily he sate, I ween, 1 
Above the chambers of the Queen. 
The interpreters, their troth who plight 
To spell the visions of the night, 
From God an answer gave : 
" Sent forth by murdered man," they said, 
" That form, to haunt the murderer's bed, 
" Had issued from the grave." 
The impious Queen in vain these offerings sends, 
To turn aside the ill that boding dream portends. 

Earth ! her graceless gifts I pour thee ! 
Earth, my mother ! I adore thee : 



(!) The idea of the evil Genius seating himself on the roof of 
the house he haunts is frequent in iEschylus. Thus, in the Aga- 
memnon, the Furies are descried on the roof of Agamemnon by 
the gifted sight of Cassandra : 

tV yap ffreyriv rrjvS' oirrror' e/cAewrei x°P° 5 

£vfi(pdoyyos, ovk tv<pa)uos' ov yap ev Aeyei. 

Kal [xh\v ireTToiKcas y\ as OpaavveaOai t:\4ov, 

{Sporeiov at/j.u, Kwfxos iv do/xois jueVet, 

dvcTTre/jLTTTOS e|co, j-vyyovwv 'Epivixov, 

i>l.ivovcri 8' vfxvov, dwfiaariv irpo(ri]fievai, 

irpooTapxov 'drrjv. iEscn. J gam. 1157. 

These halls a grisly band ne'er quit, — whose cry, 
In concert still, yet lacketh melody ; 
There, drunk with human gore, the troop of hell, 
The household Furies, ever revelling dwell ; 
Squat on the roof, with passion's flush they glow, 
And chaunt, in fiendish songs, the origin of woe. 

And soon after she discovers the children of Thyestes in the same 
situation : 

dpure 






iESCH. CHOEPH. 51 

Yet scarce my tongue thy power may dare 
To mock with ineffectual prayer : 
Can aught remove the murderer's guilt? 
Can aught atone for life-blood spilt ? 

Halls, o'erwhelmed in ruin rude ! 
Hearth, where countless sorrows brood ! 
Round you, now your Lord is slain, 
Sunless, hateful shadows reign ; 
Loyal Faith that once possessed 
Every listening subject's breast, 



Spare TOucSe tovs 56/j.ois ecprj/nevovs 

veovs, bveipoiv irpoacpepus /j.opQcafj.aaiv ; 

iraiSes, Qavovres wairepel npbs rwv (pikoov, 

XeTpas Kpewv tt\7]9ovt€S oliceius fiopas' 

avu eurepois re ffirXayxy, eTro'iKTiarou yefxos, 

npeirovs' e^ofres, wv rrur^p iyevaaro. 

Mscn.Agam. 1188. 

See, on the roof they sit, like airy dreams, 
And every form a murdered infant seems, 
Slain by their friends, a mournful load they bear, 
Their mangled entrails, once their father's fare. 

And in the Supplices of iEschylus, 635. 
8idv eirid6fj.evoi irpdicTopd re gkottov 
8v<TiroX4iJ.r)TOV, ov ovris av Sofios e%oi 
e7r' op6<pwv fXLuivovra' fiapvs 5* e<pi£ei. 

With prudent dread they learned to fear 
Heaven's strong and wakeful minister : 
When on the roof he sits, 

Heavy he falls, 
And ruin never quits 
The haunted halls. 
e 2 



52 ^ESCH. CHOEPH. 

Faith, whose firmness seemed to mock 
War and foul sedition's shock, 
Hath past away; — the cravens bow 
Their necks beneath usurpers now. 
Man to success still court will pay, 
Still honour Fortune's fickle sway, 
Exalt her to the blest abodes, 
A Goddess and above the Gods. 2 



( 2 ) Compare with this a fragment of iEschylus : 
ri>xa ,uep<f7rcoi/ apxu kcu repfxa. 
rb tcul o~o<pias Tifidu 
Qporeois £7r4d7]Kas epyois* 
kcu to Kakbv ir\4ov fy kixkov e/c aeOev. 
a re x<*-P ls AajU7rei 
irepl o~dv 7TTepvya xpvo~eov' 
Kul to Tea. wAaffTiyyi do6hv 
fiaKapKTTOTaTou TeAedet, 
<rv 8' afiaxavias Tropov e?Ses iv &Aye<n, 
Ka) Xa^ivpbv <pdos dyayes eV aKOTcp 

Trpo(pepeo~Ta,Ta decou. Frag, hie. 

O Chance, suggesting many a plan, 
Attaining many an end for man, 
How oft, when Wisdom's titles shine, 
And Craft claims praise, the work is thine ! 
Our woe's our own ; from thee we borrow 
More oft the taste of joy than sorrow. 
Grace shines around thy golden wing, 

Thy wand can bliss bestow, 
Thy bounties to thy chosen fling 

The brightest lot below. 
And, when afflictions round u^ hover, 

'Tis thine to point the way, 
And, in that midnight gloom, discover 

The opening light of day. 
Well at thy shrine may mortals bow, 
The mightiest of the Gods art thou. 






iESCH. CHOEPII. 53 

But Justice holds her equal scales 

With ever- waking eye ; 
O'er some her vengeful might prevails, 

When their life's sun is high ; 
On some her vigorous judgments light, 
In that dread pause twixt day and night, 

Life's closing twilight hour ; 
Round some, ere yet they meet their doom, 
Is shed the silence of the tomb, 

The eternal shadows lower; 
But soon as once the genial plain 
Has drunk the life-blood of the slain, 
Indelible the spots remain, 

And aye for vengeance call, 
Till racking pangs of piercing pain 

Upon the guilty fall. 
What balm for him shall potent prove, 
Who breaks the ties of wedded love ? 
And though all streams united gave 
The treasures of their limpid wave, 

To purify from gore ; 
The hand, polluted once with blood, 
Though washed in every silver flood, 

Is foul for evermore ! 

Hard Fate is mine, since that dark day, 
Which girt my home with war's array, 
And bore me from my father's hall, 
To pine afar, a captive thrall; 



54 



^ESCII. CHOEril. 



Hard Fate ! to yield to heaven's decree, 
And what I am not, seem to be ; 
Dissemble hatred, and control 
The bitter workings of the soul ; 
E'en to injustice feign consent ; 
Detest the wrong, but not prevent : 
Yet oft I veil my face, to weep 
For those who unavenged sleep ; 
Oft for my slaughtered lord I mourn, 
Chilled by the frost of grief, with secret anguish torn I 



^ESCH. EUMEN. 297. 



ARGUMENT. 

Orestes, having been encouraged by the oracle of Apollo to 
slay his mother, is for the crime pursued by the Furies, 
who form the Chorus, and sing this Ode ; in which they 
complain of the protection afforded to the criminal by 
Phoebus, and declare their own office and dignity. 



.ESCH. EUMEN. 29' 



Weave the wild dance ; awake the song ; l 

Awake the strain severe, 

And pour on mortal ear, 
What mighty honours to our race belong. 



(') Obviously imitated from this, is the song of the Furies in a 
ballad of Schiller's : 

" Ein schwarzer Mantel schlagt die Lenden, 
Sie schwingen in entfleischten Handen 
Der Fackel diisterrothe Glut ; 
In ihren Wangen fliesst kein Blut. 
Und wo die Haare lieblich flattern, 
Um Menschenstirnen freundlich weh'n, 
Da sieht man Schlangen hier und Nattern, 
Die giftgeschwoll'nen Bauche blah'n. 

" Und, schauerlich gedreht im Kreise, 
Beginnen sie des Hymnes Weise, 
Der durch das Herz zerreissend dringt, 
Die Bande um den Sunder schlingt. 
Besinnungraubend, Herzbethbrend, 
Schallt der Erinnyen Gesang 
Er schallt, des Hbrer's Mark verzehrend, 
Und duldet nicht der Leier Klang : 

" Wohl 



58 ^ESCH. EUMEN. 

Still in justice find we pleasure, 
Meting right in strictest measure ; 
He, whose hand from blood is pure, 
From our wrath may rest secure ; 
But the sinner, who would fain 
Cover murder's crimson stain, 
Still shall find his steps pursued 
By inquisitors for blood : 



' Wohl dem, der frei von Schuld und Fehle, 

' Bewahrt die kindlich reine Seele ! 

' Ihn diirfen wir nicht rachend nah'n, 

' Er wandelt frei des Leben's Bahn, 

' Das wehe, wehe, wer verstohlen 

' Des Mordes schwere That vollbracht, 

1 Wir heften uns an seine Sohlen, 

' Das furchtbare Gesehlecht der Nacht ! 

' Und glaubt er fliehend zu entspringen, 
' Gefliigelt sind wir da, die Schlingen 
' Ibm werfend urn den fliicht' gen Fuss, 
' Dass er zu Boden fallen muss. 
' So jagen wir ihn, ohn' Ermatten, 
' Versbhnen kann uns keine Reu, 
' Ihn fort und fort bis zu den Schatten, 
' And geben ihn auch dort nicht frei.' " 

Die Kraniche des Ibycus. 

A sable vest each round her flings, 
Each in her fleshless fingers swings 
A lurid torch, that dusky glows ; 
Within their veins no life-blood flows. 
And where the graceful ringlets stray, 

Round man's more kindly aspect floating, 
There only snakes and adders play, 

Their loathsome forms with venom bloating. 

Round 



jEsch. eumen. 59 

Due to the unavenged dead 
Our malison devotes his head. 
Night ! from whom, with vital breath, 
Came my lot, in life and death, 
To be for every dark offence 
Instrument of recompense, 
Mother ! to my prayer attend ; 
Shall Latona's offspring rend 
From my grasp the destined prey, 
Steal the matricide away? 



Round in the awful ring they spin, 
The measure of the hymn begin, 
That tears its way the heart to wound, 
And flings its bands the sinner round. 
It robs the wits, the heart it blasts, 

Loud pealed by the infernal choir, 
The marrow of the hearer wastes, 

Nor brooks the music of the lyre. 

" Blest, who, from guilt and error free, 
Keeps the heart's childlike purity ! 
He walks life's path secure. from fear, 
We dare not draw in vengeance near. 
Woe, woe to him, who dares conceal 

His heavy crime, the deed of blood ! 
We fasten on his flying heel, 

We dog him, Night's tremendous brood, 

" And if he think to spring away, 
We wave our wing, we net our prey, 
Around his feet our toils are cast, 
And be must sink to earth at last. 
Unwearied thus we urge the chase, 

Nor penitence can aught appease, 
On to the shades, still on we race, 
Nor grant him even there release." 



60 ^ESCH. EUMEN. 

O'er the victim we repeat 2 

Dirges for our office meet ; 

Might is in that jarring note 

From the yelling Furies' throat ; 

It can bind the soul in sadness, 

Blast the brain with blighting madness, 

Wither budding beauty's bloom, 

Hurry to an early tomb : 



( 2 ) Euripides describes the Furies in a very similar manner 

5po/xaSes fi> irrcpocpSpoi 

UoTviafies deal, 

afiaKX^TUP at Qiaaov iXax^r iv 

Sdupvai koX yoois, 

/ueAcryxpcoTes EvfieviSes al re tov 

ravaov alBep afXTraXXe(r6\ a'ljuaros 

Tivv/xeuai Siicav, rivvfjievai (poyov, 

KaOiKereiiofxaty KadiKerevofiai, 

rbv ' Ay afxe/JLVovos yovov idarar ek- 

XadeffQai Xiacras fMUViuSos (poiTu- 

Xeov. Eur. Orest. 307. 

Ye, upon rapid wing who speed, 
Ye, who the mystic dances lead, 

Whom awe-struck man reveres ; 
Wild Bacchanals in all save joy, 
For ne'er may mirth your song employ, 

But woe and sighs and tears ! 
Swart Furies ! whom your pinions bear, 
Flapping amid the expanse of air ; 
Exacted by whose vengeful crew 
Is punishment to murder due, 
Receive my prayer — let madness wild 
Quit Agamemnon's wretched child, 
And sweet oblivion wipe away 
The memory of his pangs to-day. 



^SCH. EUMEN. 61 



Never harp's responsive chord 
Quivers when that strain is poured. 
When the web of Fate was spun, 
First my service was begun ; 
Him I tend, who, spurning laws, 
Blood hath shed without a cause, 
Till he lie entombed in earth ; 
(Such mine heir-loom from my birth,) 
Nor in Hades shall he be 
From the pangs of torture free. 

Not to me to touch was given 
Pure inhabitants of heaven, 
Not to taste the social feast, 
Not to wear the snow-white vest ; 
When, in household mask, a foe 3 
Deals the dark assassin's blow, 
Mine to work his overthrow ! 
Straight our crew is slipped on him, 
Straight his glory waxeth dim, 
Straight his ancient might is fled, 
Vanquished by the gore he shed. 
Jealous of the lot we share, 
We forbid the suppliant's prayer 



( 3 ) Literally, " When Mars domesticated slays a friend." In 
accordance with this idea, which makes Mars the God of assassina- 
tion as well as of war, Chaucer places in the temple of that deity, 
" The smiler with the knif under the cloke." 

Palamon and Arcite. 



62 ^SCH. EUMEN. 

Other Deities to own — 

Vengeance is for us alone ! 

Smeared with gore, and marked by fate, 

Objects of eternal hate, 

We are exiles, forced to rove 

From the blessed courts of Jove. 

Heavy, pouncing from aloft, 
Swoop we on the victim oft, 
He, beneath the incumbent load, 
Faints and totters on his road ; 
Though be his beneath the sky 
Fame and princely majesty ; 
All his honours waste and wane 
At the coming of our train, 
When, in sable drapery wound, 
We tread the mystic dance around : 
Down he sinks, and knows not who 
The deed of retribution do. 
Such the clouds that crime can roll 
Darkling round the guilty soul ; 
Deeds of horror thus can blind 
Reason's ray that lights the mind, 
Till upon the murderous halls 
Judgment unexpected falls. 

Plots of vengeance frame we still, 
Strong to execute our will : 






JESCU. EUMEN. 63 



Awful to the dead and living, 
Unforgetting, unforgiving, 
Guided not by Phoebus fair, 
Lit by torches' lurid glare, 
Banished from the starry sphere, 
Honoured not by love but fear, 
Lives, I ween, no mortal wight, 
Who may mock our chartered right. 
Right, the sister-Fates approve, 
Sanctioned by the Powers above. 
Though we dwell the earth beneath, 
In the sunless realms of death, 
Yet, amid that dark domain, 
Honoured is our ancient reign. 



yESCH. EUMEN. 468. 



ARGUMENT. 

The Furies, apprehensive lest Orestes, whom they pursued 
in order to torture him as a matricide, should be rescued 
from them by Apollo, appeal in the following Ode against 
such an exertion of divine power, by showing the baneful 
consequences of abolishing their influence. 



/ESCH. EUMEN. 468. 



If yon matricide prevail, 
Straight from their old foundations hurled, 

The laws of ancient right shall fail, 
And other statutes rule the world : 
So from fear of vengeance free, 
Shall men combine to work iniquity. 
By children pierced, the parent's breast shall bleed; 

Children, who never rue the deed. 
No watchful Furies, in that evil time, 

Shall spring in secret on the miscreant's head ; 
No more our wrath pursue the murderer's crime ; 

Each shall strange horrors hear, each wail his dead, 
And comfort speak in vain, while woes abound, 
Against whose might no more sure remedy is found. 

Stricken then by woe severe, 
Let none repeat the empty call : 

" Justice, and throned Furies, hear ! " 
Fallen, Justice, then shall be thine hall ! 

F 2 



68 



.ESCH. eumen. 

Then the sire's, the matron's grief 
Vainly in bitter wails may seek relief; 
Conscience, once wakeful on the bosom's throne, 

Shall mark his dread dominion gone. 
Sufferings the soul to temperance inure ; 

Man learns from sorrow wisdom's sober lore ; 
What states or men, if sin could still secure 

The sunshine of the breast, would right adore? 
Praise not despotic rule, yet cursed be, 
Where punishment is not, the life of anarchy ! 

God stable strength assigns 
To moderation : — all beside 

May vary as his will inclines, 
But trouble aye is born of pride. 
To the sober soul is given 
The happiness it seeks in prayer of Heaven. 
Bow down to Justice: — Mortal man, attend ! 

Low at her spotless altar bend, 
Nor spurn with impious foot, allured by gain, 

Her holy shrine ; — for retribution's day, 
-Fraught with the bitter, certain meed of pain, 

Waits but its time the guilty to repay. 
Then, ever duteous, on thy parents wait; 
Still to the stranger ope thy hospitable gate. 

Thus, if Fate forbid it not, 
Thy virtuous course shall blessings win ; 

Ruin can never be the lot 
Of him who turns his steps from sin : 



JESCU. EUMEN. C9 

But the bold in impious cause, 
Who marred fair order, mocked at righteous laws, 
Shall drift at length before destruction's gale, 
With shivered mast, and shattered sail ; 
He wrestles mid the whirlpool, — strives to call 

On the deaf God, who, heedless of his prayer, 
Laughs at the boaster who defied a fall, 

Now tangled in the inevitable snare. 
Perished for aye, and wrecked on Justice' shoal, 
Unwept, unknown he lies : — above, the billows roll. 



SOPH. (ED. TYR. 151 



ARGUMENT. 

In consequence of a pestilence, which raged at Thebes, the 
Oracle of Apollo had been consulted : the Chorus, consist- 
ing of Theban old men, sing this Ode, after the return of 
the Messengers from Delphi, but before the answer of the 
God is divulged. They express their anxiety to learn its 
import, describe the miserable state of the city, and invoke 
the tutelary Deities to protect them from Mars, to whom 
they impute the present plague. 



SOPH. (ED. TYR. 151. 



Sweet voice of Jove ! that from the golden shrine 

Of Delphi's seat divine 
To sparkling Thebes art come, say, what may be 
The import of thy tale, thou word of destiny ? 

Quick thy hidden lore unrol ; 

Soothe my racked and thrilling soul. 

Strong to smite, and skilled to heal, 

Delian Lord ! the truth reveal. 

Burns my throbbing heart to know 
If thou wilt dry the bitter tears 

That o'er my wasted country flow, 
Or now, or in revolving years ; 
In mercy to my pangs, thy secret tell, 
Bright child of golden Hope, mysterious Oracle ! 

First of all the Powers on high, 
Hear me, Jove's immortal child, 



74 SOPH. GED. TYR. 

Pallas of the azure eye ! 

Hear me, huntress of the wild ! 
Thou, who, mid the wrangling mart, 
Idol of each Theban heart, 
Shrined on throne of living light, 
Bearest sway in sceptred might ; 
Archer Lord, whose arrows fly, 
Winged with lightning, through the sky ; 

Ye guardian three, 

Appear and be 

Averters of dark destiny ! 
If ever to our fainting cry 

Ye lent a willing ear, 
If ever erst ye drove afar 
The flames of pestilence and war, 
In woe's forlorn extremity, 

Again, again appear ! 

Round the fated city press 
Sorrows dark and numberless ; 
Nipt with desolating pain, 
Sickly fades her blooming train, 
Nor weapon of sage thought is near, 
Whereon to stay our trust, as warrior on his spear. 

The nurslings of the genial earth 

Wane fast away, 
The children, blighted ere the birth, 

See not the day, 



SOPH. (ED. TYR. "t5 

And the sad mother bows her head, 
And, with her treasure lost, sleeps mid the crowded 
dead. 

One upon another driven, 
Fleeter than the birds of heaven, 
Fleeter than the fire-flood's might, 
Rush they to the realms of night, 
Where, beyond the western sea, 
Broods the infernal Deity, 
While our city makes her moan 
O'er her countless children gone. 

Blasted in its life's young morn, 
Unwept is laid the infant newly born ; 

Contagion spreads its murderous breath, 

The lap of earth is fraught with death ; 

Mothers, o'er their loved ones bending, 

Brides, their snowy bosoms rending, 

Round the holy altars kneeling, 

Torn by keen convulsive, feeling, 
Change oft the suppliant cry to wild despair, 
While sobs succeed to drown the meek, still voice of 
prayer ! 

Then haste thee from above, 
Thou golden daughter of all-seeing Jove! 

Bid fly afar_ 
The frantic Lord of desolating war ; 



76 SOPH. CED. TYR. 

Not armed with brazen shield, 

Meet for the mailed field, 
He stems the battle's terrible array, 

His darkling hands dispense 

The shafts of pestilence, 
And flame and tumult mark his devious way. 

Bid him 'neath the billows cower, 
In Amphitrite's spacious bower, 
Or where loud the waters roar, 
Lashing Thracia's lonely shore : 
Unpi tying he, — if midnight shade 

Some pledge of love should spare, 
His noisome darts by day invade, 

And leave all blighted there. 

Lord of the starry Heaven, 
Grasping the terrors of the burning levin ! 

Let thy fierce bolt descend, 
Scathe the Destroyer's might, and suffering Thebes 
befriend. 

Speed thee here, Lycean King, 
Archer, from whose golden string 
Light the unerring arrows spring, 

Apollo, lend thine aid ! 
• And come, ye beams of wreathed light, 
Glancing on the silent night, 
In mazy dance, on Lycia's height, 

When roves the Huntress Maid ! 



SOPH. (ED. TYR. 

Thou, the golden chaplet fair 
Braiding mid thy clustering hair, 
To thy native haunts repair, 

Thy name that gave ; 
Thou, whose brow the wine-lees stain. 
Thou, to whom, on star-lit plain, 
Evoe ! sing the frenzied train, 

Bacchus the brave ! 
With thy torch of pine defy, 
(Hated by the powers on high,) 
War's unhallowed Deity : 

Haste thee to save ! 



SOPH. (ED. TYR. 856. 



ARGUMENT. 

The Thebans, in order to remove the pestilence which 
afflicted them, were enjoined by Apollo to discover the 
murderer of Laius their former king. Circumstances led 
to the belief, that (Edipus, then supposed to be the son of 
Polybus, was the guilty person ; but this seemed contrary 
to a former oracle of Apollo, which declared that Laius 
should be slain by his own son. The Chorus, apprehensive 
lest this apparent contradiction should cause scepticism, 
describe in the following Ode the immutability of Divine 
law, and the evil consequences of pride; they pray that 
their own city may remain free from this sin, and that 
Jove may vindicate the truth of the suspected oracle. 



SOPH. (ED. TYR. 856. 



May Fate accord to me, 
In word and deed, that hallowed purity, 1 

Whose laws were framed on high, 
Born in the heavenly chambers of the sky ; 



(') This passage recalls to our mind the following heautiful lines 
from Wordsworth's Excursion : 

" But, by the storms of circumstance unshaken, 

And subject neither to eclipse nor wane, 

Duty exists ; — immutably survive, 

For our support, the measures and the forms, 

Which an abstract Intelligence supplies, 

Whose kingdom is, where time and space are not." 

P. 134. 
See also the well-known passage of Sophocles, Antig. 449. 

ovoe aOeveiv tgctovtov u>6jj.7)v rd ad 

K77pu7/ua0 5 war dypairra Kaa(paXri dtoov 

vofxijxa dvvaadui Qv-qrov ovff inrepopa/j.e'tv. 

ov yap Tt vvv ye /ca^Ses, aAA 5 del tt6tc 

£fj ravra, Kovoeh olSzv e£ otov '(pdur). 

I never deemed decrees by mortals given 

Annul the sure, unwritten laws of Heaven : 

Nor of to-day nor yesterday they came, 

Through immemorial ages still the same ; 

Their vital strength still fresh, their date unknown, 

Nor changed by Senates, nor by Kings o'erthrown. 



82 SOPH. (ED. TYR. 

Olympus gave them birth, 
They sprang not from the mortal race of earth ; 

No time their might o'erthrows, 
Never may Lethe lull them to repose ; 

Nor feeble age oppress 
The unchanging God, that dwells in thoughts of 
Holiness. 

Pride genders despot rule ; 
Pride, bred in pampered school, 
Oft with bloated pomp doth diet, 
Surfeited with reckless riot : 
Climbing oft, she seeks to dwell 2 
Throned on Fortune's pinnacle ; 
Hurried from the summit straight 
Down the vast abrupt of Fate, 



( 2 ) If the reading and interpretation of Brunck should be 
adopted, the original may thus be rendered : 
Biddeth oft her votaries dwell 
Throned on Fortune's pinnacle, 
Then from highest realms of bliss 
Hurls them to the dark abyss : 
From the beetling mountain's brink, 
Down the vast abrupt they sink, 
Dashed against the barren coast, 
Where the darkling steps are lost. 

Perhaps Gray thus understood the passage, and imitated it in his 
Ode on the distant Prospect of Eton College : 
" Ambition this shall tempt to rise, 
Then hurl the wretch from high, 
To bitter scorn a sacrifice, 
And grinning infamy." 



SOPH. CED. TYR. 83 

Hurled from highest realms of bliss, 
Sinks she in the dark abyss, 
Dashed against that rugged coast, 
Where the darkling steps are lost. 
Hard though be the task assigned thee, 
Let not pride, my country, blind thee ; 
Be thy lot by Heaven decreed 
Eager service, bounteous meed. 
God, in whom for aye I'll trust, 
Holds his shield before the just ! 
But for the man, whose heart is known 
By haughty deed and lofty tone, 
Whose bosom justice never feared, 
Nor temples of the Gods revered, 
Spurning Heaven, and rapt in self, 
Led by sordid lust of pelf, 
One, who hath not kept him back 
From pollution's fatal track, 
Unto him may Fate dispense 
Pride's unfailing recompense. 
Conscience ! thou to such canst deal 
Keener stroke than blade of steel ; 
Else, if man may Heaven defy, 
If sleeps the vengeance of the sky, 
Why the idle chaunt prolong ? 
Still be the dance, and hushed the song ! 

Far, Phoebus, let thy praises swell, 
Man learn thy truth, and own thine oracle ; 

G 2 



84 SOPH. (ED. TYR. 

Else, never more, 

If thou be faithless known, 
May we in Abae's courts adore, 

Or Delphi's central throne, 
Never, at Olympian shrine, 
Own the Lord of life divine. 

If rightly, Jove, thy praise we sing, 

Universal nature's King, 

Turn not thy wakeful eye away, 

Nor let man mock thy everlasting sway. 
Mark how he, in impious hour, 
Doubts of thy prophetic power, 
Doubts the tale thy Seers of old 
Of the slaughtered monarch told ; 
How, by dark mistrust beguiled, 
He dares to scorn thy Delian child ; 
How from the rebel world are driven, 

The holy rites, the homage due to heaven. 



SOPH. (ED. COL. 674. 



THE ARGUMENT. 

OEdipus, having in his wanderings reached Colonos, a hill 
near Athens, is addressed in the following Ode by the 
Chorus, which consists of old men of Attica. They describe 
the beautiful scenery of the spot, and the blessings of their 
country, especially celebrating its olives, steeds, and fleet. 



SOPH. CED. COL. 674. 



Stranger, thou art standing now 
On Colonos' sparry brow ; l 



(') This chorus is made peculiarly interesting by the fact, that 
Colonos was the birth-place of Sophocles, and by a well-known 
story, recorded by Plutarch. The sons of Sophocles, in his old 
age, in order to obtain possession of his property, attempted to 
prove that the decay of his intellect rendered him incapable of 
managing his affairs. The Poet answered triumphantly by re- 
citing this beautiful piece, which he had recently composed. It 
is interesting to compare, with the description of scenery it con- 
tains, the account given by Hughes : — u All the images in that ex- 
quisite Chorus of Sophocles, where he dilates with rapture upon 
the beauties of his native place, may still be verified. The Crocus, 
the Narcissus, and a thousand flowers, still mingle their_various 
dyes, and impregnate the atmosphere with odours : the descend- 
ants of those ancient Olives, on which the eye of Morian Jupiter 
was fixed in vigilant care, still spread their broad arms, and form 
a shade impervious to the sun. In the opening of the year the 
whole grove is vocal with the melody of the Nightingale, and at 
its close, the purple clusters, the glory of Bacchus, hang around 
the trellis-work with which the numerous cottages and villas are 
adorned." " This terrestrial Paradise owes its beauty and ferti- 
lity to the Cephisus, from whose perennial fountains it is irrigated." 
(Hughes' Travels in Greece, I. 295.) Lord Byron has made poe- 
tical use of the little change which has taken place in the scenery 
and productions of Greece : 

"Yet 



88 SOPH. (ED. COL. 

All the haunts of Attic ground, 
Where the matchless coursers bound, 



" Yet are thy skies as blue, thy crags as wild ; 
Sweet are thy groves, and verdant are thy fields, 
Thine olive ripe as when Minerva smiled, 
And still his honied wealth Hymettus yields," &c. 

Childe Harold. Canto II. 87. 
It is again referred to by Lebrun : 

" Ah ! de ses fils perdus la Grece est attristee, 
Mais pour la consoler la nature est restee ; 
Mais sons son beau soleil, son sol, f£cond encor, 
Souritmeme a des mains avides de culture, 
Mais des bois d'olivier y donnent leur tresor, 
Mais l'oranger prodigue y repand son fruit d'or, 
La vigne ses raisins, le myrte sa verdure, 
Le glatinier ses fleurs ; les platanes £pais 
Pres des sources encor se plaisent a s'£tendre, 
En domes transparens, leurs rameaux n'ont jamais 
Sur la terre laisse tomber un jour plus tendre : 
Et ces riches vallons, aux sites enchanteurs, 
Oil du sommet des monts l'ceil charme se repose, 
Jamais au lit des eaux n'ont vu du laurier-rose 
Serpenter plus rians les meandres de fleurs." 

Voyage en Grece. 
Greece weeps her children vanished from her plains, 
Her only solace, Nature, yet remains ; 
Still shines her radiant sun : her fertile soil 
Smiles e'en to bless the peasant's niggard toil : 
Laden with treasures, groves of olive shoot, 
The lavish orange yields its golden fruit, 
The vine her clusters ; — mid the myrtle bowers 
Still richly glow the red pomegranate flowers, 
Arching aloft in many a leafy dome, 
Beside the founts the plane-tree finds its home, 
Nor ever gleamed athwart its sheltering bough 
A purer air, a softer sun than now ; 
Ne'er in those vales, o'er whose enchanted maze, 
From some tall cliff the eye delighted strays, 
The laurel-rose, in bed of waters laid, 
More laughing wreaths of gadding flowers displayed. 



SOPH. (ED. COL. 89 

Boast not, through their realms of bliss, 
Other spot as fair as this. 

Frequent down this greenwood dale, 
Mourns the warbling nightingale, 2 



( 2 ) Compare Milton : 

" See there the olive groves of Academe, 
Plato's retirement, where the Attic bird 
Trills her thick- warbled notes the summer long." 

Par. Reg. IV. 
On which passage Dunster remarks : 

" The Nightingale is with peculiar propriety introduced in this 
description of the Academe ; in the neighbourhood of which we 
learn from Pausanias (Lib. 1. c. 30) lay the place called Colonus 
Equestris, which Sophocles has made the scene of his CEdipus 
ColOneus, and which he celebrates as particularly abounding with 
Nightingales, v. 19 and v. 704." — The other passage of this play 
alluded to is the answer of Antigone to her father : 
X&pos 8' 88' Upbs, us <xa<\) eludcrui, Ppvwv 
SdcpvrjS, iAatas, d/j-TreAov' irvKvo-Krepoi 8' 
ecrw /cot' avrbv evaTO/j.ovs' drjooves. 
This spot seems sacred to some Power divine ; 
Here bloom the bay, the olive, and the vine. 
Within its deep retreats, on frequent wing, 
The Nightingales their tuneful descant sing. 

The general suffrage of poets seems to have ascribed melancholy to 
the song of the Nightingale. Thus Euripides, Helen, 1107. 

ce tclv iuavAetois virb devdpoico/xois 

/xovaela kcu ddnovs ivi^ovcrav avafiudaa), 

ah rdv aoiSordrav upviQa fteAcpdby 

ar)d6va haupvoeaaau, 

eA0 5 & Sid ^ovQav ysvvwv eA.eAi£«|UeW, 

dprjvois e/.io?s j-yvepyos, 

'EAevas peXeas ttovovs. 

Sad bird, whose tuneful haunts are made 
Beneath the deepest covert's shade, 

Where 



90 SOPH. CED. COL. 

Nestling mid the thickest screen 
Of the ivy's darksome green ; 
Or where, each empurpled shoot 
Drooping with its myriad fruit, 



Where shrubs their tresses weave above 
The sweetest minstrel of the grove : 
Sad, tearful Nightingale, whose note, 
Thick-warbled, swells thy dusky throat ; 
Come, thy melodious dirges pour, 
And Helen's griefs with me deplore ; 
The captive maids, the woes of Troy 
May well thy plaintive song employ. 

So also Milton : 

" Where the love-lorn Nightingale 
Nightly to thee her sad song mourneth well." 

Comus, 234. 
And Shakspeare : 

" Here I can sit alone, unseen of any, 
And to the Nightingale's complaining notes, 
Tune my distresses, and record my woes." 

Two Gent, of Verona, Act V. Sc. 4. 

But see Coleridge's Poem on the Nightingale : 
" Most musical, most melancholy bird ! 
A melancholy bird ? Oh ! idle thought ! 
In nature there is nothing melancholy. 
But some night- wandering man, whose heart was pierced 
With the remembrance of a grievous wrong, 
Or slow distemper, or neglected love, 
(And so, poor wretch ! filled all things with himself, 
And made all gentle sounds tell back the tale 
Of his own sorrow,) he, and such as he, 
First named these notes a melancholy strain : 
And many a poet echoes the conceit." 

In this opinion he is supported by Chaucer : 
" Then dothe the Nightingale her might 
To makin noise and singen blithe." 



SOPH. CED. COL. 91 

Curled in many a mazy twine, 
Blooms the never-trodden vine, 3 
By the Gods' protecting power, 
Safe from sun and storm and shower. 
Bacchus here, the summer long, 
Revels with the Goddess throng, 
Nymphs who erst, on Nyssa's wild, 
Reared to man the rosy child. 4 



( 3 ) It may be reasonably doubted whether the laurel, or rather 
bay, is not the shrub intended by Sophocles : in one of the hymns 
attributed to Homer, it is mentioned, in conjunction with the ivy, 
as forming the garland of Bacchus. (See the passage quoted in 
the note on line 22.) If this interpretation be adopted, the lines 
may be thus rendered : 

Or where round the laurel bush 
Thousand clustering berries blush, 
Nursling of the joyous God, 
Ne'er by mortal footstep trod. 
Never Summer's angry glare 
Lays its leafy honours bare, 
And the storm, that scathes the plain, 
Sweeps its verdant boughs in vain. 

( 4 ) Compare Homer's Hymn to Bacchus : 

%v Tpi<pov rivKoyLQi vv/j.<pai irapd irarpos dvatiros 
de^d/xevai KoX-noiai, Kal ivdviceoos cut'itoWov 
Nvo~r)s iv yuaAois" '6 S 5 de'|6TO irarpos '4kt)ti 
durpcp iv euwSet fierapiQ^iios a.Qavd.Toio~iv. 
aindp eireiS)) rovOe 6eal iro\vvfj.uov eOpetyav, 
Si] to't€ (poiTifco-Ks Kaff v\i]£VTas ivavXovs 
Kicraw Kal 8d<pvr) ireirvKaa/ievos' ai S 5 a/.L eirovro 
Nvfupai, 6 S 1 ifyys'iTO' Bpofxos 8' %X* V &o"rreTOV v\t]u. 

In Nyssa's vales the bright-haired Nymphs caressed 
And clasped the immortal infant to their breast ; 
Where perfumed breezes sighed, the boy was laid, 
Watched by his sire, beneath the grotto's shade ; 

There 



SOPH. CED. COL. 

Here Narcissus, day by day, 
Buds, in clustering beauty, gay, 
Sipping aye, at morn and even, 
All the nectar dews of heaven, 
Wont amid your locks to shine, 
Ceres fair and Proserpine. 3 
Here the golden Crocus gleams, 
Murmur here unfailing streams, 
Sleep the bubbling fountains never, 
Feeding pure Cephisus river, 



There reared to manhood by the Goddess throng, 
The future theme of many a grateful song, 
He loved along the woody dells to stray, 
Bind round his brow the ivy and the bay, 
With those fair Nymphs attendant, far to rove, 
And fill with festive song the echoing grove. 

It is proper to mention, that Nyssa is not specified by Sophocles 
as the place where Bacchus was cherished by the Nymphs. 

( 5 ) According to Homer, it was the beauty of the Narcissus 
which principally attracted Proserpine in the- fields of Nyssa : 

vapKiaativ 0', ov ecpvae SoXov naXvutoiritit. Kovprj 
Tcua Albs fiovXrjcri x a P l ^°^ vr t ToXvSeKTri, 
QavjxaffTov yavocoi/ra, aefias Se re ttcutiv Ihecrdai 
adavarois re 6eo?s ride Qvr\Tois auOpcoirois' 
rod Kal cwro pifas ettarov Kupa e^eiretyvKei' 
KrjcoSei t' 08/J.fj iras t 5 ovpavos evpvs vwepOev 
yaid re nets' eyeXacrffe Ka\ aXfj-vpov old/xa OaXacrcris. 
71 8' dpa da/J.fir)<Tas' o>pe£aro x e P^ LV &H-' d/mcpco 
kuXov &dvpfia Xa$e7v' x<* ve $e %^ v svpvdyvia. 
Nvffiov afAireSiov, rf} opovaev dva\ iroXvheyixwv 
'{ttitois aOavdroKn, KpSuov ttoXvoovv^ios vios. 

Earth heeded Jove ; to Pluto lent her aid, 
And bade Narcissus shine to lure the maid ; 

In 



SOPH. (ED. COL. 93 

Whose prolific waters daily 

Bid the pastures blossom gaily, 

With the showers of spring-tide blending, 

On the lap of earth descending. 

Here the Nine, to notes of pleasure, 

Love to tread their choral measure, 

Venus, o'er these flowrets gliding, 

Oft her rein of gold is guiding. 

Now a brighter boast than all 
Shall my grateful song recall ; 
Yon proud shrub, that will not smile, 
Pelops, on thy Doric isle, 6 



In splendour strange its beauteous head it raised, 

And Gods and mortals wondered as they gazed : 

On one light stalk a hundred flowrets hung, 

Far on the breeze its odorous scent was flung ; 

Heaven's wide expanse with joy the perfume quaffed, 

The verdant earth, the briny ocean laughed ; 

The admiring maiden strained her eager grasp, 

But sought in vain the lovely toy to clasp ; 

Quaked all the plain; — earth yawned; — the King of Death 

Rose, drawn by steeds immortal, from beneath. 

( 6 ) Pindar speaks of the olive as originally flourishing among 
the Hyperboreans, and thence conveyed by Hercules to Elis : 

"A re Tliffa fie yeycovelv ras airo 

Osv/xopoi v'uraovr eV avQpdjirovs aoiSal, 

w rivi, Kpaivwv ((perfxas 

'HpaicAeos irporepas, 

UTpeK7)S 'EWavod'iKas yXecpdpcaf 

AtVwAbs cti/7?p v\p66ei/ 

a/A<p\ Kop.ai<Ti fiaXoi yXav- 

Koxpoa Koafiov iAaias. rdv irore 

"larpov 



94 SOPH. (ED. COL. 

Nor on Asiatic soil, 
But unsown, unsought by toil, 
Self-engendered, year by year, 
Springs to life a native here. 
Tree the trembling foeman shuns, 
Garland for Athena's sons, 7 



''iffrpov and aKiapuu imyiiv eveinev 

'A/xtpiTpvupiddas, 

fivajxa, ra>v 'OAvfxiria, KaWiarov &d\wv, 

da/xov 'Tirepfiapecav ireiaas, 'AwoA-' 

\wvos Bepdiroura. Bye 

iriffTCt. (ppoveow, Ai6s vitrei iravSoKto 

akaei cTKiapov re (pvrevfia 

tpvov avdpwirois, are(pav6v t operas. Pind. 01. III. 17. 

Pisa bids me breathe the lay, 

Pisa, from whose hallowed plains 

Proceed the godlike minstrel strains, 

For him who wins the day ; 

Around his throbbing brow, 
Obedient to decrees 
Of ancient Hercules, 
See the Eleian arbiter display 

The silvery olive bough ; 
The olive, that from Ister's shore 
Alcmena's son in triumph bore, 
Where o'er the cbilling stream it wove, 
Mid Hyperborean tribes, an ever- verdant grove. 
True votaries of the Delian God, 

They gave it to the Hero's prayer; 
Amid Olympia's wood, by thousands trod, 

To rear its branches fair ; 
For weary limbs wreathing an arbour's shade, 
And, for the victor's brow, a wreath untaught to fade. 

( 7 ) The word iraidorpocpov admits of the passage being rendered 
thus: 

Terror of the adverse host, 
Food our babes delight in most. 



SOPH. (ED. COL. 95 

May the olive long be ours, 
None may break its sacred bowers, 
None its boughs of silvery grey 
Young or old may bear away : 
Morian Jove, with look of love, 
Ever guards it from above, 
Blue-eyed Pallas watch unsleeping 
O'er her favourite tree is keeping. 

Swell the song of praise again ; 
Other boons demand my strain, 
Other blessings we inherit, 
Granted by the mighty Spirit; 
On the sea and on the shore, 
Ours the bridle and the oar. 

Son of Saturn old ! whose sway 
Stormy winds and waves obey, 
Thine be honour's well-earned meed, 
Tamer of the champing steed : 
First he wore on Attic plain 
Bit of steel and curbing rein. 8 



( 8 ) The allusion here is to the well-known contest between 
Pallas and Neptune. See Ov. Met. VI. 70. 

" Cecropia Pallas scopulum Mavortis in arce 
Pingit, et antiquam de terra? nomine litem. 
Bis sex ccelestes, medio Jove, sedibus altis 
Augusta gravitate sedent. Sua quemque Deorum 
Inscribit facies. Jovis est regalis imago. 

Stare 



96 SOPH. CED. COL. 

Oft too o'er the waters blue, 
Athens, strain thy labouring crew ; 
Practised hands the bark are plying, 
Oars are bending, spray is flying, 
Sunny waves beneath them glancing, 
Sportive Nereids round them dancing, 
With their hundred feet in motion, 
Twinkling mid the foam of ocean. 



Stare Deum pelagi, longoque ferire tridente 
Aspera saxa facit, medioque e vulnere saxi 
Exsiluisse ferum ; quo pignore vindicet urbem. 
At sibi dat clypeum, dat acutse cuspidis hastam 
Dat galeam capiti ; defenditur aegide pectus. 
Percussamque sua simulat de cuspide terram 
Prodere cum baccis foetum canentis olivae : 
Mirarique Deos: Operi victoria finis." 

Next in the web, in mimic strife, 
Pallas and Neptune start to life, 

Mars' Hill appears in view ; 
To judge the combat throned and crowned, 
Twelve Gods august are seated round, 

And each a portrait true. 
Jove in the midst, most like a king, 
" The centre of the glittering ring," 

And He, the Lord of Ocean ; 
His trident deals its heaviest shock, 
The steed emerges from the rock, 

The crags are all in motion : 
And next, the Goddess stands revealed, 
With aegis, helmet, spear, and shield, 

A Maid, armed cap-a-pie, 
She wounds the soil, — the shrub strikes root, 
The silvery olive sheds its fruit ; 

The Gods the prize decree ; 
Thenceforth for aye sball Cecrops' plain, 
With olives crowned, the name retain 

Of that kind Deity. 



SOPH. (ED. COL. 1048. 



THE ARGUMENT. 

Creon, having conveyed away by force the daughters of 
CEdipus, is pursued by Theseus with an army. During 
their absence the Chorus sing the following Ode: they 
express a wish to join the Athenian host ; conjecture the 
course probably pursued by them ; predict their victory, 
and invoke the assistance of the Gods. 



SOPH. (ED. COL. 1048. 



Waft me hence, and set me down, 
Where the lines of battle frown ; 
Waft me, where the brazen shout 
Of the Lord of War rings out 
On the Pythian coast, or where 
Flickering torches wildly glare, 
Where on mystic rites have smiled 
Ceres, and her honoured child. 
Many a priest attends their shrine, 
Sprung of old Eumolpus' line, 
While discretion's golden key 1 
Locks their lips in secrecy. 
Round the virgin-sisters twain 
Soon shall fall the crowded slain, 



(') Compare Hamlet, I. 3. 

" 'Tis in my memory locked, 
And you yourself shall keep the key of it.' 
h 2 



100 SOPH. GED. COL. 

Theseus soon, in mailed might, 
Wake the terrors of the fight. 
Now, I ween, in haste they glide 
CEa's snowy rocks beside ; 
There, beneath the western sky, 
Swift their straining coursers fly, 
Rapid roll their whirling cars ; 
Fleeter speeds pursuing Mars ; 
Theseus' train is on its way, 
Keen to grasp the destined prey ; 
Every bit like lightning glancing, 
Every mailed knight advancing, 
Every charger's arched neck 
Princely spoils and trappings deck. 
Yours the vow for victory won, 
Hippian Pallas ! Rhea's son ! 
Thou, who, throned in coral caves, 
Claspest earth, and rulest waves ! 2 
Is the awful stillness past? 
Have they closed in fight at last? 
Answer, my prophetic soul ! 
Thou canst secret fate unrol. 
Soon, I ween, shall warrior sword, 
Wielded by Athena's lord, 



( 2 ) Compare King John, V. 2. 

" O nation ! that thou couldst remove ! 
That Neptune's arms, who clippeth thee about, 
Would bear thee from the knowledge of thyself." 



SOPH, CED. COL. 101 

Free the maid, by sorrow bowed, 
Mocked and scorned by brethren proud : 
Thus shall righteous Jove to-day 
Judge for her the dubious fray ; 
So, across my spirit's dreams 
Joy anticipated gleams. 
Might I, like the soaring dove, 
Roam the aerial fields above, 
Her, who, borne on tempest wings, 
Forth with rustling pinion springs, 
Sweet it were, from clouds on high, 
Battle's changeful tide to spy. 
Jove ! whose everlasting sway 
Heaven's unchanging Gods obey, 
Jove ! before whose piercing eyes 
Bare each thing created lies, 
Let not; on the conflict plain, 
Theseus spread his toils in vain ; 
Grant to Athens' champions brave 
Might to vanquish, strength to save. 
Pallas ! Jove's majestic child, 
Phcebus ! hunter of the wild, 
Dian ! still the woodland wooing, 
Still the dappled stag pursuing, 
Archer lord, and mountain maid, 
Haste ye, haste ye to our aid ! 



SOPH. GED. COL. 1218. 



ARGUMENT. 



The Chorus take occasion from the misfortunes of (Edipus 
to moralize on the condition of man. 



SOPH. (ED. COL. 1218. 



There are, who would the life of man 

Protract beyond its little span : 

But dreaming fools seem such to me, 

And hoarders up of vanity. 

Man is but brought by length of years 

More nigh a land of grief and tears ; 

Vainly he casts his eyes around, 

To search for joy, that is not found, 

While still, with fond desires possest, 

Repines his over-yearning breast. 

One only healing hour remains, 

The hour when Hades' monarch reigns, 

When Fate, without the bridal choir, 

Without the dance, without the lyre, 

And Death, man's comforter and friend, 

Appear, his weary course to end. 



106 SOPH. (ED. COL. 

Of all the dreams of bliss that are, 
Not to be born is best by far; l 



(') Compare Ecclesiastes iv. 2,3. — "Wherefore I praised the 
dead, which are already dead, more than the living, which are yet 
alive. Yea, better is he than both they, which hath not yet been, 
who hath not seen the evil work that is done under the sun." 

See also the following passage of Milton : 

" Better end here unborn, — why is life given 
To be thus wrested from us ? rather why 
Obtruded on us thus ? who, if we knew 
What we receive, would either not accept 
Life offered, or soon beg to lay it down, 
Glad to be so dismissed." 

Compare also the following lines of Lamartine : 

" J'ai vecu, j'ai passe ce desert de la vie, 
Oft toujours sous mes pas chaque fleur s'est ftetrie, 
Oft toujours Pesperance, abusant ma raison, 
M'a montre le bonheur dans un vague horizon ; 
Ou, du vent de la mort les brulantes haleines 
Sous mes levres toujours tarissaient les fontaines. 
Qu'un autre, s'exhalant en regrets superflus, 
Redemande au passe ses jours qui ne sont plus, 
Pleure de son printems l'aurore evanouie, 
Et consente a revivre une seconde vie. 
Pour moi, quand le destin m'offrirait a mon choix 
Le sceptre du g6nie, et le trone des rois, 
La gloire, la beaute, les tremors, la sagesse, 
Et joindrait a ses dons l'dternelle jeunesse, 
J'en jure par la mort, dans un monde pareil, 
Non ! je ne voudrais pas rajeunir d'un soleil. 
Je ne veux pas d'un monde, oil tout change, ou tout passe, 
Oii, jusqu'au souvenir, tout s'use et tout s' efface, 
Oft tout est fugitif, passable, incertain, 
Oft le jour du bonheur n'a pas de lendemain." 

Yes, I have strayed along life's desert road ; 
Daily the flowrets withered where I trod ; 

Still 



SOPH. (ED. COL; 107 

Next best, by far the next for man, 
To speed as fast as speed he can, 



Still Bliss was placed by cheating Hope in view, 
But, with the horizon fleeting, still withdrew ; 
Beneath my lips I've felt the fountains fail, 
Drained by the blast of Death's destructive gale. 
In vain regret, their woes let others pour, 
Ask of the past the days that are no more, 
Weep for the morning of their spring-tide fled, 
Consent anew life's weary path to tread. 
For me, though lavish Fate should make my own 
The crown of genjus, or the monarch's throne, 
Fame, beauty, wealth, the instinctive glance of truth, 
And add to all her gifts eternal youth, 
By Death I swear, while thus life's course is run, 
I'd not be younger by a single sun. 
I cannot love a world, where all betrays, 
' All changes, passes, Memory's self decays, 
On Joy's brief day where never morrows rise, 
All fleets and fades, all vacillates and dies. 

Equally melancholy sentiments with regard to human life pervade 
most of the Greek poets. See, among many other passages, 
Eurip. Med. 1193. 

to. Qi>y\ra V oh vvv irp&rov rjyodfxai o~K.ia.T-', 

ovh" au rpetras e'liroifJit, tovs crocpovs fipoT&v 

SoKovuras eivcu teal fxupijxvqTas \6ycou 

tovtovs nsyi<TT7)v [xwplav ocpXiaKaveLv. 

&vr)T&u ykp ovb~eis eariu ei/Salfxccv (pvaei' 

6\l3ov S 5 imfipvevTOS, evTi>xeo~T€pos 

aWov ysvoiT h.v d\\os, 6\j3ios S 5 au ov. 

'Tis sad experience bids the though tfu say, 
The things of earth, like shadows, fleet away. 
Those wisest deemed, who, wrapped in study, pore 
O'er nature's mysteries, or on learning's lore, 
Who waste life's hours amid sequestered schools, 
Rank but the first among the train of fools. 
None, none are blest! — Wealth pampers mortal Io 
And Fortune smiles, but happiness is not. 

And 



108 SOPH. (ED. COL. 

Soon as his eyes have glanced on earth, 
To where he was before his birth ! 



And a fragment of Menander : 



tovtov evrvx^Tarov \4yu, 

oorns dewp-fjaas aAvirws, Tlapfxevwv, 
ret a€[A.va iravT airrjAQev, '6dev ^A0ei/, rax", 
rbt> *f)\iov rbv koivov, do'Tp', vSup, vk<p7\, 
irvp' r avrcL, Kav eKarbu err] jStcooreTat, 
uxpei irap6vTa, kUp iviavTovs o 1 <p6Sp > bxiyovs, 
aefu/OTepa tovtwv arep ovk ctyei ttotz. 
TTuvhyvpiv v6fiia6u tiv eiuai rbv xpo'wv, 
'bv (prjfjil, tovtov, tV emBr](ji.iuv &va>, 
b'xhov, ayopas, KAeirTas, Kvfidas, 5iaTpi/3as. 
av irpuTOS ££e\8r)s, KaTaXvcrtis /SeA/noV 
icpoBi %x av o-Trrj\6fs, ex^pos ovdevl, 
b ■Kpocb'iaTpifSctiv Komdcras airehacre. 
icaKcvs T6 yr/pcop, ii/derjs tov yiveTai, 
peixfiojxevos ix^P 0VS e ^P> zirz&ovXsvdT) 7ro0e* 
ovk evQavaTws airijAOev ikQoov els xpo^ou. 

He is the happiest man, whose eye, 
Just glancing nature's majesty, 
The sun's impartial light, 

The fire, the clouds, the deep, 
The twinkling stars of night, 
Is straightway closed in sleep. 
Whose footsteps to the distant bourn 
From whence he came, with speed return. 
For though on earth a hundred years he range, 
He shall not look on nature's change ; 
The elements, the heavens so fair, 

That met his infant gaze, 
A more majestic beauty wear, 
Than ought beside displays. 

Life is a fair, where thousands jostle, 
Where all is dice, and thieves, and bustle, 
All tumults fierce, and wranglings loud ; 
And we are pilgrims mid the crowd. 

Who 



SOPH. (ED. COL. 109 

For when unthinking youth is nigh, 
Girt with thin forms of levity, 



Who would not long such scene to leave, 
Ere strife or losses bid him grieve ? 
To be the first his home to win, 
Or rest him in some quet inn ? 
The lingerer finds but toils unceasing, 
Sorrows, and wants, and foes, increasing ; 
No certain joy, no changeless friend ; 
A darker life, a bitterer end. 

The opposite views which may be taken of human life are prettily 
contrasted in the following Epigrams : 

Troii)v Tis fiioTOio Tajxoi rp'ifiov ; etV ayopfj fj.\v 

veiicea Kal xa\e7ral irpT)!-i€S' ev Se dofjois 
(ppovTiZes' iv 5' aypo?s Kafxdrwv a\is' iv <5e daXuacrr) 

rdp&os' iirl ^eivqs 8', fy fj.ev e'xTjs rl, 5eW 
t)v 5° a-rropijs, avi-qpov' ex^'S ya.jJ.ov] ovk afj.epif.ivos 

ecraeai' ov yafjeei.s ; £fjs ex' iprj/aoTepou. 
rsKva irovoC Trfjpoocris anais foios' at z/eoTTjTes 

a<ppoves' at iro\ia\ 5' e/xiruAiv aSpavees. 
rfv dpa Tois dio~o~o7v evbs cupeais, ^ to yeveadai 

lU^Sen-OT 5 , ?) to daveiv ahr'uca riKTofxevov. 

Tell me in what state of life, 

Man may ever happy be? 
In the mart is wrangling strife, 

In his home anxiety. 
Howsoe'er his course be planned, 

Still vexation shall he reap, 
Toils fatigue him on the land, 

Terrors wait him on the deep ; 
Wilt thou rove 2 if wealth be thine, 

Thou mayst be the robber's prey ; 
If without it, thou mayst pine, 

Cheerless, on thy lonely way. 
If by wedded love attended, 

Thou shalt have increase of care ; 

Art 



110 SOPH. (ED. COL. 

What woes are absent from his train ? 
What shapes of labour and of pain? 
There muster Envy and Debate, 
Malice and Battle, Strife and Hate ; 



Art thou single? unbefriended, 
Thou must sink beneath despair. 

Woe from children shalt thou gain, 
Yet without them must thou mourn ; 

Youth is Folly's idle reign, 
Age is feeble and forlorn. 

This the best that can befal, 

Either not to be at all, 

Or from life received to fly, 

And as soon as born to die. 



iravToi-qv fiioTOio rdfxois rplfiov etV ar/opfj fiev, 

KrjBea Kal -kivvtcu irp^ies' h 8e Sopots, 
dfXTravfx' eV 8' aypo?s (pvcrtos X"-P ls ' * v $ e 6a\dcr<Tij 

Kepdos' e7ri j-eivris, 7]V /j.ev ixV s T '> k\4os' 
t)v 8' airoprjs, [xovos oTSas' e%6is ydfiov ; oTkos dpiaros 

eacerai' ov yctfieeis ; £fjs «?t' eAacpporepoW 
reKva irodos' acppovris anais fiios. al veorrjTes 

pcofiaXeaf iroAial 8' ep-TraXiv sitae fiees. 
ovk dpa root/ dicraoou evbs atpecris, r) to yeveadai 

/j.r)deiTOT, fy rb 6uue?v avrUa TiKTo/xeuov. 

Man may find life's pathway brightened, 

If he will, where'er he roam; 
In the mart his mind's enlightened, 

Rest refreshes him at home ; 
Howsoe'er his course be planned, 

He shall still enjoyment reap ; 
Nature smiles upon the land, 

Gain is gathered from the deep. 
Wilt thou rove? — if wealth be thine, 

All will thy behest obey; 
Art thou poor ? — none need divine 

The secret, if thou still art gay. 



SOPH. CED. COL. 1 1 1 

Till comes, the butt of scoffers' scorn, 
That lot, the last, the most forlorn, 
With none to aid, to love, to know, 
Age, with his household, Woe on Woe ! 2 



If by wedded love attended, 

Comfort smiles around thy hearth ; 
If without, till life is ended, 

Thine is liberty and mirth. 
Joy from children mayst thou gain ; 

Childless, thou from care art free ; 
Youth is Vigour's healthful reign, 

Age is fraught with piety, 
"lis not the best that can befal, 
Either not to be at all, 
Or from life received to fly, 
For life is all felicity. 

There is a passage of Aristophanes, in which he seems to have 
collected most of the phrases by which the Greek Tragedians 
express the wretchedness of man : 

"Aye 877 (pvo~iv avSpes apiavpofiioi, (pvWcau yevea irpoao/xotoi, 
oXiyob'pavees, TvKaafxara irrjAov, antoeiSea <^GA 5 a/xev^vd, 
airrrives £<pt]ixlpioi, raXaol fipoTot, avepes elueXoveipoi. 

Man, clouded o'er with grief! 

Thou moulded thing of clay ; 
Man, fading as the leaf, 

The creature of a day ; 
Weak nestling, wretched, dying, 

Imbecile, made to moan, 
A shadow quickly flying, 

A dream, just seen and gone ! 

(a) Gray employs a metaphor somewhat similar: 

" The painful family of Death, 

More hideous than their Queen." 

Ode on the. Prospect of Eton College. 

But 



112 SOPH. CED. COL. 

Beneath whose weight opprest, decline 
The years of GEdipus and mine. 
As billows, by the tempest tossed, 
Burst on some wintry northern coast, 
So, toppling o'er his aged form, 
Descends the fury of the storm ; 
The troublous breakers never rest ; 
Some, from the chambers of the West, 
Some, from the orient sun, or where 
At noon he sheds his angry glare, 
Or where the stars, faint twinkling, light 
The gloomy length of Arctic night. 



But the expression of Sophocles is best illustrated by Chaucer : 

" With Elde Labour and eke Travaile 
Lodgid bene, with Sorowe and Wo, 
That nevir out of her court go, 
Paine and Distresse, Sicknesse and Ire, 
And Melanc'ly, that angry sire, 
Ben of her palais senatours, 
Groning and Grutching her herbegeours : 
The day and night her to tourmenr, 
With cruill Deth thei her present, 
And tellin her erliche and late. 
That Deth stondeth armid at her gate ; 
Then bring thei to her remembraunce 
The foly deeds of her enfaunce." 

Romaunt of the Rose, 4997—5009. 



SOPH. ANTIG. 332. 



SOPH. ANTIG. 332. 



Many a wile hath nature taught 

By instinct's secret call ; 
But man, with sovereign reason fraught, 1 

In cunning passeth all. 



(*) A train of reflection very similar to this occurs in Herschel's 
Introduction to the Study of Natural Philosophy, chap. i. — 
" Man is the undisputed lord of the creation. The strongest 
and fiercest of his fellow-creatures, the whale, the elephant, the 
eagle, and the tiger, are slaughtered by him to supply his most 
capricious wants, or tamed to do him service, or imprisoned to 
make him sport. The spoils of all nature are in daily requisition 
for his most common uses, yielded with more or less readiness, 
or wrested with reluctance, from the mine, the forest, the ocean, 
and the air. Such are the first-fruits of reason." Menander, in 
the following lines, playfully maintains the opposite opinion : 

"Attuvto. to. f<£' ecm ixaKapicarepu, 
ku\ vovv iypvra. paWou avdp(Jiirm> iro\6. 
rov ovov bpav el-eari irpwra rovrovl. 
ovros KUKoSaliJLWV iarlv 6/j.o\oyovfiev<as. 
TovTtp KaKbv hi avrbv ovBev yiuercu, 
it 8' t) (pvrrts SeSw/cei/ avry, tout' ex**- 

I 2 W^s 



116 SOPH. ANTIG. 

'Tis his, across the foam-white tide, 
Before the wintry blast to ride, 
Though billows round him swell and roar, 
He skims along from shore to shore. 
The Goddess Queen of eldest birth, 
Undying, inexhausted Earth, 



rjfMSLS Se, x^P 15 Tcav avayKaiwv kclkcov, 
avrol Trap' avroov erepa Trpoairopi^o/nev. 
XvirovjJi.€d\ av Trrdpr) tis' av S 5 eXirri k<xk£>s, 
dpyi£6/Ji.e6'' av ?8r) tis hvirviov, a<p68pa 
(pofiovfjLed'' av y\av£ avaKpdyy, SeSowcafiej/. 
ayccviai, So|at, (piKorifxiai, vo/j.oi f 
airavra ravr 4irl6era rrj (picrei Kaicd. 

If character's distinctive features 

Attentively you scan, 
You'll find that e'en the dullest creatures 

Have all more wit than man ! 
Yon shaggy ass, on thistles fed, 

Is wretched, all agree ; 
And yet it truly may be said, 

He's far more blest than we. 
He takes what Nature's hand bestows, — 

And Nature still is kind, 
But oh ! Man's wishes and his woes 

Are not by her confined : 
Opinion's difference, passion's strife, 

Oppression's iron hand, 
Ambition's ever restless life, 

Heed not her mild command. 
If haply your next neighbour sneeze, 

You start, and cry, "God bless you " 
An angry word can mar your ease, 

A boding dream distress you. 
If hoots the owlet, bird of fate, 

It wakes your superstition ; 
Such fancied ills will man create. 

To darken man's condition. 



SOPH. ANT1G. J 1 

He wears with toil from year to year, 

He guides the steed, and turns the share. 

The silly birds, an easy prey, 

The fowler bears entrapped away. 

The hunter clears the covert's side ; 

By fisher's art the depths are tried, 

Where for the finny race are set 

The meshes of the folded net. 

The beast that stalks the mountain bare, 

Or makes amid the fields his lair, 

O'ermastered lies by reason's plan, 

And yields to all-inventive man. 

The steed beneath the yoke is prest, 

Fast-bound amid his shaggy crest ; 

The bull, that roamed the hill-top free, 

Bows to unwonted slavery. 
And gifted man himself hath taught 
Utterance of speech and airy thought, 
Hath learnt to govern fierce debate, 
And sway the councils of a state ; 
And when, upon the frozen ground 
Chill winter sheds its shafts around, 
He shuns, while stormy seasons lower, 
Neath structured roof the inclement hour. 
For shifting Fortune's shock prepared, 
No moment finds him off his guard ; 
And, though at last to Death he quail, 
That only foe who must prevail, 



118 SOPH. ANTIG. 

Yet can his wit devise escape 
From fell distemper's varied shape. 
Outstripping hope, man hath at will 
Invention quick, and subtle skill, 
Now framing good, now fostering ill. 
If faithful to his country's laws, 
True to his oath in righteous cause, 

High be his place and fame ; 
But if from honour's side he stray, 
Impatient of her kindly sway, 

Sunk be his outcast name ; 
For such no love my bosom knows, 
Nor such shall at my hearth repose. 



SOPH. AN TIG. 579, 



ARGUMENT. 

The Chorus, attributing the misfortunes of Antigone, who 
was about to suffer for disobeying Creon, to the crimes of 
the Labdacidae, her ancestors, describe the manner in 
which the sins of the fathers are visited on the children. 
They represent the law that punishment must follow trans- 
gression as a consequence of the immutability of Jove; 
and show how productive it is of sorrows to the human 
race, since most men are beguiled into the pursuit of evil. 



SOPH. AN TIG. 579. 



How blest are those, untaught to drain 
Retribution's cup of pain! 
Sorrow's heaven-commissioned shock 
Can the mightiest palace rock. 
Tremble then the deep foundations ; 
Then, through countless generations, 
Gathering on to son from sire, 
Higher raves the storm and higher ! 
As when inclement blasts of Thrace 
Heave from its depths the ocean, 

Scudding in rapid race, 

Through its darkling caves, 

The swelling waves 
Set the stormy sands in motion : 
Each after each, with sullen roar, 
Sweeps the abyss's miry floor, 

The waters splash, 

The billows lash 
The groaning, echoing shore. 



122 SOPH. ANTIG. 

See the troubles reviving, 

O'er Labdacus shed, 
See woes of the living 

Join woes of the dead! 
The father's life in anguish ends, 
Fate's heir-loom to the son descends : 
For the God, in secret lurking, 
Still their overthrow is working. 
The last shoot of that ancient tree 
Was budding fair as fair might be, 
And, beaming o'er it, seemed to shine 
The fostering light of love divine : 
Frenzy of spirit and folly of tongue 
O'er it anew the cloud have flung. 

The infernal band 

Its downfall planned : 
With gory scythe and unrelenting hand 
See from the shades the Furies hie ; 

Its buds they crop, 

Its branches lop, 
And leave the sapless stem to die. 

Shall judgment be less strong than sin I 
Shall man o'er Jove dominion win ? 
No! sleep beneath his leaden sway 
May hold but things that know decay. 
The unwearied months with Godlike vigour move, 
Yet cannot change the might of Jove. 



SOPH. ANTIG. YZo 

Compassed with dazzling light, 
Throned on Olympus' height, 
His front the eternal God uprears, 
By toils unwearied, and unaged by years. 
Far back through seasons past, 

Far on through times to come, 
Has been and still must last 
Sin's never-failing doom : 
Doom, whence with countless sorrows rife 
Is erring man's tumultuous life. 
Some, heeding hope's beguiling voice, 

From virtue's pathway rove, 
And some deluded make their choice 
The levities of love. 

Heedless they dream through pleasure's hour, 
Nor mark the outstretched arm of power, 
Till sure revenge its victim claims, 
And burst their trance the scorching flames : 
For well and wisely was it said, 
That all, by Heaven to sorrows led, 
Perverted by delirious mood, 
Deem evil wears the shape of good, 1 



(') Erfurdt quotes the following old Iambic lines in illustration 
of this sentiment: 

orau yap opyr] Sutfiovoov $\ainri nud, 
tovt avrb irpwrov QcxpaipUTai (ppevocu 
tov vovv rhv icrd\by, sis de 1-771/ X^P 00 Tp«r« 
yi/d/iriu, 'lv et5?? nrfikv u>v d/napTaya. 

When 



124 SOPH. ANTIG. 

Chase the fair phantom, free from fears, 
And waken to a life of tears ! 



When on some mortal's fated head 
The wrath of vengeful Heaven is shed, 
The Gods first banish from his soul 
Reflection's merciful control, 
And lull his senses in the trance 
Of soft, beguiling ignorance ; 
Unconscious moves he mid the gloom, 
Nor knows his sin, nor dreads his doom. 



SOPH. ANTIG. 777. 



ARGUMENT. 

Antigone had been condemned to death for burying her 
brother contrary to the commands of Creon. Haemon, son 
of Creon, betrothed to Antigone, defends her cause against 
his father. The Chorus in this Ode take occasion hence 
to describe the irresistible power of Love, and express their 
sympathy with Antigone and Haemon. 



SOPH. ANTIG. 777. 



Unconquered Love ! whose mystic sway 
Creation's varied forms obey, 1 



(') Compare the following fragment of Sophocles : 

S> 7raT5es, H] roi Kvirpts, ov Kvrrpis fxovov, 
aAA. 5 €<tti TToWG>v bvofiaToiv iirwvv^os. 
ecrriv /xeu A'/Stjs, eari 8' tiupOiros (Sia, 
%gtiv 8e Xvffca /xaivas. to~ri 8 5 'ifxepos 
&Kparos, eoV oi[xwy^.6s. iv Kelvr) to vav, 
(jirovdaiov, rjavxcuov, is fiiuv dyov. 
£vT7iK€T<zi yap ttusv/xouoou '6<rois svi, 
^/vxh tls ovx^ rrjcrSe ttjs 0eou fiopd ; 
€tVepx €Taf 7®P lx®v<»v ttXojtcS y4uei" 
eveari 8' iv x*P°' 0V rcT-pao-weAe? yovfj' 
uufia 8' eV olwvolcn Tovneivrjs irrepov, 
iv dripalv, iv 0poro7criv, iv deols dvw. 
riv ov ira\aiovs' is rpls eK&dWei Otuv ; 
et fioi. de/xis, Qifxis 8e rdx^drj Xeyeiv, 
Albs rvpavve? irv€Vfj.6vwv, dvev Sopos' 
(ivev o~idr)pov iravra tol crvvTe/xverai 
Kwrpis to. 9vr)T<£v ku\ Qswv j8ouA.eu/u«Ta. 

A thousand titles Venus bears, 

A thousand changing forms she wears ; 

Now passion wild ; now frenzied madness ; 

Now strength, now death, now plaining sadness ; 

All 



1£8 SOPH. ANTIG. 

Who watchest long at midnight hour, 2 
On the soft cheek of beauty's flower ; 
Now inmate of the sylvan cot, 

Now flitting o'er the waves, 
Immortal Gods escape thee not, 
Thou rulest man's ephemeral lot, 

And he, who hath thee, raves. 3 



All that can tranquillize or stir, 

All opposites unite in her. 

All beings her behest obey, 

All hearts become in turn her prey. 

She swims with fish the stormy main, 

She walks with quadrupeds the plain, 

She dwells in huts with mortals, 
She cleaves the sky with birds of air, 
Enters alike the wild beasts' lair, 

The Gods' celestial portals. 
Nor one of all the heavenly band 
May dare defy her unarmed hand ; 

Nay — though the tale be treason, 
Without a spear, without a sword, 
She rules the universal Lord ; 
Nor against her may aid afford 

Divine or human reason. 

( 2 ) " Ille virentis, et 
Doctae psallere Chiae, 

Pulcris excubat in genis." 

Hor. Lib. IV. Ode IS. 

Chia ! bright in Beauty's spring, 
Skilled to wake the warbling string, 
Love, on airy pinions free, 
Blooming Chia ! flits to thee, 
Keeps, with never-slumbering eyne, 
Watch on that fair cheek of thine. 

( 3 ) Shakspeare declares " the Lover all as frantic" as the avowed 
madman. (Midsummer Night's Dream.) And Burton, (Anatomy of 

Melan- 



SOPH. A?\TIG. 129 

Thy magic warps the right to wrong, 
And troubles now the kindred throng ; 
The look of love, yon destined bride 

Darts from her pleading eye, 
A subtle counsellor, hath vied 
With mighty laws and princedom's pride, 

And won the victory ; 



Melancholy), " Love is a madness ; — that lovers are madmen, no 
one will deny." 

So also Byron : 

" Who loves, raves: — 'tis youth's frenzy." 

Compare Metastasio: 

" Sperar senza consiglio, 

Temer senza periglio, 
Dar corpo all' ombre, e non dar fede al vero : 
Figurar col pensiero 

Cento vani fantasmi in ogni istante, 
Sognar vegliando, e mille volte il giorno, 

Morir senza morire, 

Chiamar gioja il martire, 
Pensar ad altri, ed obbliar se stesso, 

E far passaggio spesso 
Da timor in timor, da brama in brama, 
E quella frenesia che amor si cbiama." 

To hope where hope is vain, 

To fear, from danger free, 
To trust in shadows, then again 

To doubt reality. 
To nurse, each idle hour that flies, 
A thousand fickle fantasies; 
To dream awake; to pine away, 

Yet bless the pangs that kill; 
To die a thousand times a day, 

And yet be living still; 

k Each 



130 SOPH. ANTIG. 

For in that supplicating gaze 

The Queen of Love resistless plays. 

I feel my stern resolves relent ; 

Too harsh those mandates seem ; 
My tears, within their fountain pent, 
Flow forth a gushing stream, 
To think that o'er thy woes, 
Sad maiden, soon must close 
The chambers of the dead, where all for aye repose. 



Each struggling thought of self to smother 
In ceaseless musings on another; 
From hope to hope with restless mind, 

From fear to fear to rove ; 
Such is the frenzy that mankind 

Deck with the name of Love! 



S O P H. A N T I G. 1 102. 



K 2 



THE ARGUMENT. 

Tiresias having declared that heavy judgments would fall 
on Creon, King of Thebes, for his treatment of Antigone, 
the Chorus, in the following Ode, entreat Bacchus to come 
either from Parnassus or Eubcea to the aid of Thebes, the 
country of Semele his mother. 



SOPH. AN TIG. 1102. 



O thou, by many a name adored, 
Thy Theban mother's glory, 

Son of the Thunderer ! Guardian lord 
Of bright Italia famed in story ! 

King of the Eleusinian vale, 
Where Ceres' bounties never fail, 1 



( l ) Bacchus is frequently associated with the mysteries of 
Ceres. See Eurip. Ion. 1074. 

ul(rxvvoixai rbv ivoXvv^vov 

Qibu, et 7rept KuAAix^poiai irayuls 

AafnrdSa Otccpbv elicddw 

6\p€T<Zl eVVVXLOS O.VTTVOS &v, 

otc kcu Aios ao-repeoirbs 
avexopzvcrev cu'(%» 
Xopzvti §e SeAavo 
teal irevT7)KovTa Kopai 
Ni7pe'os, ai Kcrra ttovtuv 
aevvdcav re irorafxwu 
divas xopeud,uevca 

TO.V XP v ^O(TT€(pUVOU KOpUP 

koI f-iarepa ae/j-pdv. 

I blush 



134 



SOPH. ANTIG. 



Bacchus ! throned mid Thebe's walls, 
Mother of thy bacchanals, 
Where the pure Ismenus flows, 
Where the dragon-race arose ! 
Oft, on the doubly-crested height, 
Where nymphs of Corycus delight 

To revel on the green ; 
Where flows Castalia's sacred stream, 
The smouldering fires, that nightly gleam," 

Thy Godlike form have seen : 



I blush lest Bacchus mark our throng ; 

Bacchus, theme of many a song ; 
When maids in mystic ring are dancing, 
When, on the sacred day advancing, 
Our torches round the well are glancing. 
For fixed are aye his wakeful eyes 
On Ceres' midnight mysteries. 

When the moon, beside the waters, 

Dances with the starry air ; 
When speed in troops old Nereus' daughters, 

To tread a choral measure there ; 
They who, deep in ocean's caves, 
Or amid the restless waves 
Of streams that roll their chafing tide, 
By some perennial fount supplied, 
Whirling oft in dances wild, 

The giddy torrent stem, 
For hallowed Ceres and her child, 
Queen of the golden diadem ! 

( 7 ) Compare Eurip. Phoen. 22G. 

S> Acifxirovaa irerpa rrvpbs 
diKopvcpov (riXas vwhp ait.pwi' 
Bcwx G ' w ^> Atouicruv 
oiva 0\ a KuOa/Upiou 



(TTUfeii 



SOPH. ANTIG. 135 

And Nysa's verdant banks, where twine 3 
The ivy and the clustering vine, 



(rrd^eis rbv iroXvKupirov ol- 
vdvQas Utcra Borpw, 
£d8ed t' dvrpa SpaKOvros, ov- 
peiai re (TKOTTiat deuu. 
vi<poBo\6v t' upos Upbv, ei- 
Xiaaruiv dOavdrus deov 
XOpbs yevnlfxav &<pofios, 
irapa l ueo'6/j.(pn\u yva\a $oi- 
Bov, Aipnav itpoAnrovaa. 

Thou crag, that towerest o'er the height. 

Where Bacchus loves to stray, 
Where, shed from either summit, light 

Mysterious seems to play ; 
Thou vine, with thousand clusters hung, 

Whence, daily, wine is welling ; 
Ye haunted scenes the cliffs among, 

Thou cave, the dragon's dwelling ; 
Thou snow-clad hill! O might I flee 
To tread the sacred dance on thee, 
And far from Dirce's fountains roam, 
To view Apollo's central -home ! 

And Eurip. Ion. 713. 

tVo rs SeipdSiS Tlapvaaov ireTpas 
exovaui o~k6tt£\ov ovpdviov 6' edpav, 
tra Banxios, djxcpnrvpovs dvzx<*> v irev- 
Kas, Xaupiipd irr)- 
ca vvKTiiroAois d/u.u <tv'j Bdnxcus. 

There Olympus' cliffs arise, 
Crags, that tower to meet the skies, 
Bacchus there, in either hand, 
Waves at night the pine-tree brand, 
Lightly o'er the summits bounding ; 
Bacchanals their lord surrounding. 

(/') At Nysa, in Eubcea, was said to be a vine, remarkable for the 
miraculous rapidity with which its grapes ripened. It is probably 

alluded 



136 SOPH. ANTIG. 

Have sent thee forth, while round thee rung 
Evoe ! from many a votary's tongue, 
To view that city of the earth, 

The most beloved by thee ; 
Thebes, home of her who gave thee birth, 

The lightning-blasted Semele. 

Fell Plague, with iron hand, 

Now grasps that fated land : 
Preserver ! speed with healing step to save, 
Or down Parnassus' slope, or o'er the booming wave. 



alluded to in the passage of the Phcenissse quoted above ; and 
again in the following fragment of the Thyestes of Sophocles : 

v E<rn yap tis cuaAia ir6\is 
777s Evfiaeias, zvQa BaKX 6i0? fiorpvs 
e7r' y)fxap epirti' -FpSoTa \xkv Au/XTrpas eco 
iceK\7ifJLa,TO0Tcu x®P 0S ' oivduOris 54/u.as 
e?r' -fji-iap av^ei /xeaauv, ofxcpaKos rpoirov, 
koX KXiverui ye, KaTToirepKovTtxi fiorpvs' 
de'iAy 8e Travel refj-uerai fiAacrrovfj.evr) 
kuAcos biroopa, KavaKipvarai ttotov. 

Upon Eubcea's coast is seen 

A wondrous vine to shoot, 
At sunrise 'tis with tendrils green, 

At sunset dark with fruit ; 
At dawn it spreads its leaves around, 

At noon-tide blooms its flower, 
And soon with grapes its boughs are crowned, 

That ripen every hour : 
And now more soft, now purple grown, 

The clusters lade the vine, 
And when the evening shades draw on. 

The peasant quaffs the wine. 



SOPH. ANTIG. 137 

Thou that in mystic measures leadest 

The fire-breathing orbs on high, 
Thou that with ear attentive heedest 
Thy Bacchant's midnight minstrelsy ! 
Appear, thou radiant boy, 
Great son of Jove, bright lord of joy ! 
Thy frenzied throng, thy Naxian maidens, bring, 
Who, whirled in dizzy mazes, sing, 
Throughout the livelong night, thee, their immortal 
King ! 



SOPH. TRACH. 94. 



ARGUMENT. 



Hercules having remained long absent from his home, the 
Chorus in this Ode express their desire to know where he 
may be lingering, and attempt to console Deianeira. 



SOPH. TRACE 94. 



Thou flaming Sun ! whom spangled Night, 1 
Self-destroying, brings to light, 
Then lulls to sleep again ; 



(*) Compare a fragment of Stesichorus (Ed. Giles) : 

'AeAtus 5' 'TirepioviSas SeVas 

eauarefiaiue xp-bcrzav, 

ucppu 8t' 0DKeavo7o irepdaas 

acpinoiB' lepas irorl fievdea 

vvktoS ipe/xvas, 

irorl (.iwrepa., Kuvpifiiav r &Xoxov, 

7raif8as re (piXovs. 

The Sun, Hyperion's child, behold, 
Now launched upon his bowl of gold, 
Through Ocean bound to take his flight 
To the dusky caves of holy Night, 
Where flock his children round his side, 
Where dwell his mother and his bride. - 

The "bowl of gold" is explained by the following passage of 
Mimnermus : speaking of the sun, he says, 

rov fj\v yap 8m Kv/.ca cpepei iro\vf)pa.TOS ewrj 
KOiKt), 'H<puio~Tuv xeptrlz/ ehrjAa/neurf 

Xpvaov 



142 SOPH. TRACH. 

Bright Herald, girt with beaming rays, 
Say, where Alcmena's offspring strays ; 2 

Say, lurks he on the main ? 

Or lays his head to rest, 
On Europe or on Asia's breast ? 

In pity deign reply, 

Thou of the lordly eye ! 



Xpvaov rijiirieuTos, vnoirrepos, OLKpov £<f> iiSwp 
evSovtf dpTTohicos, x^pov acp' 'EaTreptdcay, 

yuiav es Aidioiruv 'iva ol Qobv dpfia nai 'iiriroi 
iffrus', 6<pp' 'H&s ripiyeveia /uoAti' 

iud' ine^T] kripcav d^ewy 'Tirepiovos vlos. 

In a hollow couch he lays his head, 

To skim the sea's dominions, 
Of precious gold is framed the bed, 

And launched on airy pinions. 
'Twas wrought of old by Vulcan's hand, 

It wafts through Ocean lightly, 
From Hesperus' maids to iEthiop land 

Hyperion slumbering nightly. 
There are his steeds and chariot stowed, 

Till early morn arise, 
Then quits his midnight shell the God, 

And mounts again the skies. 

( 2 ) Compare Homer, Hymn to Ceres, 62. 

'He\iov 8 s 'Ikovto, dew ckottov 7j5e kcu avdpaiv, 
crrav 8' 'Itvttuv irpoirapoiB?, ko\ etpero 8ta 6eawV 
'HeA.t 5 atd<z<T<rai fxe 0eas vnep, e<f -/rore St? aev 
t] en-et t) epycp KpaBirjv ical Ovfibv trjua' 
Kohpr\v, %v ereKOV, yAvKepov 6a\os, ei'Sei." Kvdp7)v, 
rrjs a8ivr)v ott' anovcra 8t' alOepos arpvyeroio 
(Ixrre &iu£ofji.€vris, arap ouk ftW 6cp9a\fxo7criv. 
a\Xa (Tv yap 8?? ircxrau enl xQova Kal Kara itovtov 
alOepos e/c 8177s KarudepKccu aKTiveffffiv, 
ur)fj.epTews fJLOi evKrrre, <pl\ov tckos, ei* ttou uircoiras, 
oottis voacpiv 4fj.e7o Aa/3cW asKovaav avayttrj 
oix.€Tai rje 6ewi> 7) iced QvTyr&v avdpanroop. 



They 



SOPH. TRACIf. 1 -4-3 

His bride, erst won by desperate fray, 
Muses where lies his dangerous way ; 
Like some sad bird, her soul is set 
On constancy and vain regret : 
Sleep never seals those eyes, where woe 
Lies all too deep for tears to flow, 
While thought and boding Fancy's dread 
Flit ever round her lonely bed. 

Oft when the northern blast, 
Or southern winds unwearied rave, 

Ye see the ocean cast 
In quick succession wave on wave ; 



They reached at length the Sun's ahode, 
The faithful spy of man and God, 

They stood before his steeds ; 
Then thus the Goddess spoke : — " If e'er, 
" When brooded o'er thee anxious care, 

" I've soothed by word or deeds ; 
" Grant in return a mother's prayer, 
" Where is my child ? oh ! tell me where ! 
u No sweeter bud might bless the eye, 

'•' Glorious her beauty shone, 
" Through the waste of air her hurried cry, 
" A voice of struggling agony, 

" I heard, but heard alone. 
" I saw her not : — but thou the maze 

" Of earth and air canst spy, 
" From heavenly aether dart thy rays 

" Their searching scrutiny. 
" Tell me then, for thou canst say, 
" Who bore by force the maid away ? 
ir Who matured the fatal plan 1 
" Was it God, or mortal man?" 



144 SOPH. TRACH. 

So, to whelm old Cadmus' son, 
Rush redoubled labours on, 
Thick as round the Cretan shore 
The swoln and turbid billows roar : 
Yet his step from Pluto's halls 
Still some unerring God recalls. 
My Queen ! disdain not thou to brook 
My chidings kind, and soft rebuke, 
Nor cast away, in morbid mood, 
The cheering hope of future good. 
For universal nature's lord, 
Saturn's great son, by all adored, 
Enjoyment willed not to bestow 
On human lot, unmixed with woe : 
Grief and delight, in endless change, 3 
Round man in mazy circles range, 



( 3 ) Compare the following passage from Sackville : 

" Then looking upwards to the heaven's leames, 

With nightes starres thick powdred every where, 

Which erst so glistened with the golden stremes 
That golden Phoebus spread down from his sphere, 

Beholding darke, oppressing day so neare : 

The sodaine sight reduced to my mind 

The sundry chaunges that on earth we finde." 

See also Cornelia, (Dodsley's Old Plays,) vol. ii. p. 253. 
" The wide world's accidents are apt to change, 
And tickle Fortune stays not in a place ; 
But like the clouds continually doth range, 

Or like the sun that hath the night in chace. 
Then as the heavens, by whom our hopes are guided, 
Do coast the earth with an eternal course, 

We 



soph, tracii. 145 

Like never-setting stars, that roll 
In ceaseless courses round the pole. 
Soon spangled night must yield to day, 
Soon wealth, soon trouble flits away ; 
In turn, so fixed the eternal plan, 
Bliss and bereavement wait on man. 
My Queen! on hope thy soul be stayed, 

Nor yield thee to despair ; 
When bath not Jove his children made 

His providential care ? 



We must not think a misery betided 

Will never cease, but still grow worse and worse. 

When icy Winter's past, then comes the Spring, 
Whom Summer's pride with sultry heat pursues; 

To whom mild Autumn does earth's treasure bring, 
The sweetest season that the wise can chuse. 

Heaven's influence was ne'er so constant yet, 

In good or bad as to continue it. 

See also Burton's Anatomy of Melancholy : 

" 'Tis most absurd and ridiculous for any mortal man to look 
for a perpetual tenour of happiness in this life ; 'tis like a chequer 
table, black and white : 

' Invicem cedunt dolor et voluptas.' 

He that knows not this, and is not armed to endure it, is not fit to 
live in this world ; he knows not the condition of it, where, with a 
reciprocal tie, pleasure and pain are still united, and succeed one 
another in a ring." 



EURIP. HEC. 444. 



L 2 



THE ARGUMENT. 



The following Ode is supposed to be sung by a Chorus of 
Trojan women, who, after the capture of their city, had 
fallen to the lot of the conquerors as slaves. 



E U R I P. H E C. 141. 



Thou gale ! thou ocean gale ! 
That waftest light our shallop o'er the waves, 

Where shall the fluttering sail 
Convey a weeping band of captive slaves? 

Shall Dorian land, 
Or Pthian strand 

Inure our youth to toil, 
Where, sire of mighty waters, feeds 
Apidanus the flowery meads ? 
Or shall the loudly-dashing oar 
Conduct us, mid the billows' roar, 

To weep on Delian soil ? 
W T here palms l their earliest bloom display, 
Where rears its sacred shade the bay,. 



(') Compare Horn. Hym. in Apol. Del. 

Xoupe, naicoup* 3) Atjto?, eVet re/ces ayAau tckvu, 
'AiroAXowa t duuKTa kou "ApTe/xiv io-^4aipav, 
t)\v [.Ckv sv ""Oprvyir], rhv Se Kpavurj eVt A-^Aw, 
KeicXifxwr) rrphs /xanpov opos ku\ KvvOiov ox^ou, 
ayxoTOLTU} (po'iviKos €7r' 'ivu-rroto peeOpois. 

Hail ! Latona, blessed for ever ! 
Mother of a peerless pair ! 

For 



150 EURIP. IIEC. 

That erst on lorn Latona smiled, 

Now loves to grace her deathless child, 

Must we, mid Dian's virgin ring, 

Her bow and golden fillet sing ? 

Or shall our lot be fixed by Fate, 

Within Minerva's Attic gate, 

To bid the forms with meaning rife 

Start on the canvass forth to life ? 

Deck the rich web with patterns quaint, 

Thy mimic chargers, Pallas, paint, 

And yoke them to thy radiant car, 

Or trace the Titans' impious war, 

Who sunk to sleep beneath the brand 

The Thunderer launched from either hand ? 

My children ! take my parting tear ; 

Take it, mine ancient sires ! 
My land ! where rages Graecia's spear, 

Mid ruin, smoke and fires : 
Now Europe's handmaid ! — far from thee, 

They '11 taunt me as a slave ; 
Oh ! ill exchange such agony 

For chambers of the grave ! 



For who may shun Diana's quiver? 

Or who Apollo's wrath can bear? 
She in Ortygia's isle was born ; 
He on Delos' rocks forlorn ; 
Though long the steep, and dark the brow 

Of frowning Cynthus seem, 
Yet there the palm its friendly bough 

Spreads o'er Inopus' stream. 



EUR I P. HEC. 880, 



ARGUMENT. 



The following Ode is supposed to be sung by captive Trojan 
women, after they had reached the Thracian Chersonesus 
on their way to Greece. 



E U R I P. H E C. 886. 



My native Troy ! to future ages, 

Thine ancient title none shall tell, 
The City of the Impregnable ! 
The spear, the spear, within thee rages ; 
Dark lowers the cloud of Greeks around thee : 
Ne'er, ne'er again 
May I tread thy plain ; 
Shorn are the towers that crowned thee, 
Soiled is the vest that bound thee 
With ashes' foulest stain. 

The fatal hour was*nidnight's calm, 

When the feast was done, and sleep, like balm. 

Was shed on every eye ; 
Hushed was the choral symphony, 

The sacrifice was o'er ; 
My Lord to rest his limbs had flung, 
His idle spear in its place was hung, 

He dreamed of foes no more : 



154 EUR1P. HEC. 

And I, while I lost my listless gaze 

In the depth of the golden mirror's blaze, 

That my last light task was aiding, 
Was wreathing with fillets my tresses' maze, 

And with playful fingers braiding. 

There came a shout ! 
Through the noiseless city the cry rung out ; 
" Your homes are won, if ye scale the tower, 
" Sons of the Greeks ! is it not the hour?" 

I caught the wild alarm ; 
I fled arrayed 
Like Dorian maid, 
With a single vest thrown o'er me ; 
At Dian's shrine my suit preferred, 
But ill my prayer the Goddess heard, 

They slew my Lord before me ; 
I was dragged along by a ruffian arm, 

To the briny deep they bore me : 
Thence, as the vessel o'er the wave 

Heaved on its homeward way, 
To Troy one parting look I gave, 

Then sunk and swooning lay. 

Helen ! I woke to curse thy sins, 
Base sister of the Godlike twins ; 
Thee and thy craven Paris, nursed 
Mid Ida's hinds and herds, I cursed. 



EURIP. IIEC. 155 

Your wedlock, demon-planned. 

Hath driven me forth to roam, 
Hath swept me from my father's land, 

Unhoused me from my home. 
Wedlock ! — nay, let its title be 
That foul fiend's dark malignity ! 
But ne'er may Helen, o'er the billow, 

Be safely borne to Greece, 
Nor in her father's palace, pillow 

That guilty head in peace. 



EURIP. PHGEN. 784. 



ARGUMENT. 

Polynices, son of CEdipus, having formed an alliance with 
Adrastus, King of Argos, marched to attack his brother 
Eteocles, who disputed with him the sovereignty of Thebes. 
The Chorus, resident in that city, but composed of Phoe- 
nician women, sing, on occasion of this war, the following 
Ode to Mars, and contrast the ancient glory of Thebes 
with the troubles which had overwhelmed it since the acces- 
sion of the house of Labdacus. 



EURIP. PH(EN. 784. 



Author of woes, relentless Mars ! 

Busied in death and strife, 
How with the feast of Bacchus, jars 
Thy madding life ! 
Not in the festal ring, mid beauty's bloom, 
Thy tresses loosely float ; 
Nor thine the liquid note, 

The lotus-breathed strain, 

That bids the graceful train 
The mazy steps resume. 

War's armed hosts are thine ; 
The Argive Champions press on Thebe's line, 
Kindled by thy flaming breath, 
Thou leader of the dance of death, 
Whose only music is the cry 
Of battle's joyless revelry! 
Ne'er was it thine to rear 
The ivy-wreathed spear, 



160 EURIF. PI1CEX. 

Nor roam, in fawn-skin 1 clad, the mountain side; 

The car, the bit, the sword, 

Own thee their restless lord, 
To thee obedient wheels the trampling charger's 
pride. 

Now, beside Ismenus' stream, 

For thee the horseman's trappings gleam ; 



(') This was the peculiar dress of Bacchus. Compare a passage 
attributed by Macrobius (Saturnal. I.) to Euripides, but still 
extant in the Frogs of Aristophanes : 

Aiovvaos %s, 8vpaoi(Ti Kal vefipwi/ Sopcus 

KadaTTTos, iv TrevKaiai Tlapvaadbv KaraTnjSa x°P*voov. 

Around his limbs the fawn- skin wearing, 
The spear enwreathed with ivy bearing, 
While the torch of pine in his hand is glancing, 
See Bacchus on Parnassus dancing. 

And in the following lines, quoted as Orphic by Macrobius (ibid.) 
in which the sun is identified with Bacchus, the God is described 
as thus arraying himself : 

irpwTa fikv apyvcpeais evuXiyKiov aKTivecratv 
iriirKov (poivineov irvpuKeKov a/j.(pij3a\4a8ai' 
avrap vrrepBe vefipoio iravatoAov evpv KaQa^ai 
Sepfj.a iro?\.vaTiKTOU drjpbs kvto. Se|tov &[iov, 
u<TTpwv dcuSuAeav fi(fJ.r]fi lepov re ivoKoio. 

First the God around him threw 

A flame-like robe of crimson hue, 

Bright as are the glowing rays 

That stream from the sun in summer days. 

Next across his shoulders drawn 

Was the dappled skin of mountain-fawn, 

By whose thousand spangles a type was given 

Of the stars that ?era the holv heaven. 



EURIP. PIIGEN* 161 

By thee inspired, the Argive foes 
The children of the earth oppose; 
Marauding chiefs ! their daily meal 
'Tis theirs to purchase by their steel, 
Nor quail, though massy walls defy 
The prowess of their chivalry. 

Strife ! a mighty Goddess thou ; 

By thy severe decree, 
O'erwhelmed with troubles, bow 

The doomed Labdacidae. 

Cithaeron ! mid whose heaven-blest grove, 
A thousand beasts in freedom rove, 
Eye of Dian ! 2 nurse of snow ! 

Why, mid thy thickets budding wild, 
Was laid the infant-heir of woe, 

Jocasta's outcast child ? 



( 2 ) Compare Milt. Par. Reg. IV. 

" Athens, the eye of Greece," 8rc. 
And the well-known passage of Catullus : 

" Peninsularum Sirmio, insularumque 
Ocelle, quascunque in linguentibus stagnis, 
Marique vasto fert uterque Neptunus, 
Quam te libenter, quamque lsetus inviso, 
Vix mi ipse credens Thyniam, Bithynosque 
Liquisse campos, et videre te in tuto." 

Sirmio, where nature softly smiles, 
Eye of peninsulas and isles ! 
Thou fairest spot the waters lave, 
In tranquil lake or tossing wave, 

m Thou 



162 EURIP. PIICEN. 

Of sufferings presage meet, 
E'en then the golden clasp wounded his tender feet. 

Why, from thy wood-girt crown, 

Flew the fell monster down, 
The accursed Sphynx, a virgin's grace assuming ? 

Why (by the Nine abhorred) 

Was her dread descant poured, 
To early death the sons of Cadmus dooming ? 

When, on these our walls descending, 

When, her crooked talons bending, 
With her prey in rapid flight, 
She soared to realms of unapproached light, 

When Hades' monarch found in her, 
Against the Theban race, his chosen minister ! 

See ! on sorrow's ancient stock 

Anew the buds of strife are blowing, 

Our homes, our city, feel the shock, 
The sons of (Edipus o'erthrowing. 

For the silent lapse of time 

Cannot change thy nature, crime ! 



Thou fairest spot by Neptune found, 
Far as the shores his empire bound ; 
Returning from Bithynia's snows, 
How at thy sight my bosom glows, 
Yet scarce believes that I can be 
Escaped from Thrace, restored to thee 



EURIP. PHCEN. 1C)3 

Wedlock that the Gods forbid 
Ne'er shall be of trouble rid, 
Ne'er may righteous Heaven approve 
Offspring of unholy love. 

Yet wert thou great of old ; 
Far in my childhood's home, thy glory, Thebes, was 
told : 
How, when, gorged with many a feast, 
Fell the purple-crested beast, 
From thy teeming sod released, 

His teeth's armed offspring sprung ; 
How each proud, immortal guest, 
Fair Harmonia's bridal blest ; 
How, by a master's finger prest, 

The harp enchanted rung ; 
'Tis Amphion's charmed lay, — 
See the stones his lyre obey, 
And, mid the rising turrets, play 

Two never-failing streams ; 
There flows, in herbage-margined bed, 
The rill, from Dirce's fountain fed ; 

Here bright Ismenus gleams : 
And horned Io, loved of yore 
By Jove, Cadmean monarchs bore ; 
And thousand, thousand blessings fell, 
Thebes, on thy favoured citadel, 
Thy citadel, now glancing down 
On that wild camp of Mars, that girds thee like a 
crown. 

M 2 



EURIP. MED. 818. 






ARGUMENT. 



Medea, deserted by Jason, resolves to kill her children, and 
then to take refuge with /Egeus, King of Athens. The 
Chorus dissuade her from the murder by representing the 
beauty and sanctity of Athens. 



EURIP. MED. 818. 



Blessed from the olden time, 
Cradled in a sunny clime, 1 
Culling from each holy dell, 
In every age impregnable, 
Brightest wisdom's precious fere, 
Gliding through their dazzling air, 
Sons of Heaven, with courtly grace. 
Bloom the Erechtheidan race. 
There Pierian maids of yore 
Yellow-haired Harmonia bore \ 
Venus there a pearly draught 
From the pure Cephisus quailed, 



(') Compare Milton, l'.u- Reg. IV. 

" on the JEgean shore a city stand?;, 
Built nobly, pure the air and light the soil." 

We learn from Cicero, that the superiority of Attic wil was re- 
ferred in some measure to the clearness of the atmosphere in Attica 



168 EUR1P. MED. 

Then athwart the flowery vales 
Wafted softly tempered gales, 
Rosy garlands, perfume breathing, 2 
Mid her mazy tresses wreathing. 
All her loves attendant came, 
And with wisdom blent, to frame 
Perfect virtue, that should be 
Graceful in its purity ! 



( 2 ) Compare Chaucer's description of Venus : 

" A citole in hire right hand hadde she, 
And on hire hed, ful semely for to see, 
A rose garland, fresh and well smelling." 

Knight's Tale. 196L 

Compare also the following fragment attributed to Sappho : 

al toIs (LvBecriv tf6e\ep 6 Zeus iiriOelvcu &acri\ea, to podov 
av twv av6ect>v ejSaciAeue. yus icrrl KocrfAOS, cpvroov ky\aio~ixu, 
6(p0a\fxos av6eoov, epvOa/na Aeifxoouos, KiikXos aarpdirrov epcuTos 
Trveei, 'Acppomrav 7rpo|e^et, zveiSeai cpvAAois ko/ulS,, evKwfjrois 
7reTd\.ots rpvcpq' to irtraKov rep Ze<bvpa> yeXd. 

If Jove should make a Queen of flowers, 

The rose his queen should be; 
The ornament of summer bowers, 

The pride of earth is she. 
Eye of flowrets ! meadow's glow, 

Dazzling like lightning glare, 
Thence fraught with love sweet odours blow, 

And Venus nestles there. 
Her leaflets float like airy tresses, 
Her buds the roving gale caresses ; 
Those buds that coyly love to play, 
And Zephyr with a smile repay. 



EI RIP. MED. 169 

Shall then that city of the waters, 

That land, to righteousness a friend, 
Admit among her spotless daughters, 
The mother that her children slaughters ? 
Mark to what thy counsels tend : 
To mercy let thy murderous purpose bend. 
See us, to dissuade thee, kneeling, -\ 

And no more, thy bosom steeling, > 

Nerve thine arm, and blunt thy feeling. 5 
How can that eye, 
On thy doomed offspring fixed, be tearless still and 
dry? 
How, when thy pity they implore, 
And suppliant fall thy feet before, 
Canst thou thy delicate hand imbrue in infant gore? 



EURIP. HIP. 1270. 



EUR I P. HIP. 1270. 



Venus ! thy eternal sway 
All the race of man obey; 
Heaven's unbending spirits own 
Thraldom of thy power alone. 1 
Waving o'er thee as he flies 
Painted plumes of thousand dyes, 
Love on rapid pinion speeds ; 
Now he flits o'er flowery meads, 



( l ) Compare Anac. Frag. 

"Epwra yap rov a&phv 
/j.4XTTop.ai, fipvovra fxirpais 
TTO\vavQ4fj.ois aeiBuv. 
6yh nal decau SvvaaT^s, 
ode ical fipSrovs Sa/xd^ei. 

Love my lyre shall now employ ; 
Love, the soft and pampered boy, 
Wreathed with bands of thousand flowers, 
Nurslings of the spring-tide hours ^ 
Tyrant he of Gods above ; 
Mortals bear the yoke of Love. 



174 EURIP. HIP. 

Now where, softly murmuring, flow 
Ocean's briny waves below; 
When from high, in frenzy wild, 
Swoops thy golden-gleaming child, 2 



( 2 ) Different genealogies of Love are given by the Greek writers. 

According to Plato (Symposium), he is the son of Poverty and 

Contrivance. Compare Aristoph. Av. 694, 

Xdos %v, Kal vt/£, epefiSs T€ fxiXav -npoorov, nal Taprapos evp{>s. 
777 S 5 , ovS' a?7p, ovd' ovpavos i\V ipefiovs 8* eV airelpocri k6\ttois 
Tittret irpwTKTTOV virrjve/juov vv\ 77 /xeAuvSirTepos ch6v. 
e£ ov TrepireWofJiduais &pais e/JAacrrej' ''Epcas o irodsivbs, 
arixficov v&tov Trrepvyoiv xpvauiv, clicks ave/xcoKecn divcus. 
ovtos 8e x^ et Trrepoei/Ti /xiyels v\)y[($ Kara, Tdprapov svpvu 
ii'eoTTevffe yevos fj/jLerepov, kou irpwrou avhyaysv is (puis, 
irpSrepov 8' ovk i]V ykvos aduvaToov, irpiv "Epcas avu4/xi^ev airuvra. 

In former times, so legends tell, 

Lived Chaos, Darkness, Night, and Hell, 

A lonely band, before that Earth, 

Or Air, or Light, or Heaven had birth. 

Then Night reclined on Darkness' breast 

Her raven wing, and built her nest ; 

There, sheltering in the boundless shade, 

A solitary egg she laid. 

The egg is hatched : from out it springs 

Young Love, with golden gleaming wings, 

Fleet as the driving wind ; 
In Tartarus' palace, by his side, 
Moved Chaos dark, his winged bride, 

Thence sprung our feathered kind ; 
Nor ye the ancient lineage scorn, 
Of Love the Gods themselves were born. 

Compare also Simmias Rhodius : 

othi ye Kvirpidos irais, 
uKvireTCLS 8' avrbs "Epws KaXevfiai' 
ovri yap eKprjvu /3la, Trav 8' iirpdvua ireiQol. 
ei/ret ifiol ycua, 9a\acraas re nvxbs, x^ Keos ovpauSs re, 
rcSv eyci* eKvoacpiaafxav coyvyiov anaiTTpov, tKpivov 8e 6eo?s defiiaras. 

Though 



EURIP, HIP, 175 

Beasts that roam the mountain side, 
Tenants of the ocean tide, 
Man, and every race, that earth 3 
Gently fosters from their birth ; 



Though fleet my wing, and Love my name, 

I am not Cytherea's son ; 
Not mine to kindle Passion's flame, 

But gentle hearts by me are won. 
The earth, the sea, the brazen heaven, 
Are all to my dominion given; 
The sceptre of the Gods I stole, 
And sit supreme and rule the whole. 

(a) Compare Homer's Hymn to Venus: 

Movad fioi ivveire epya TroAvxpvcrov 'AtppoSlrTis, 
KvTrpiSos. rjT€ Qeoiaip eiri yXvKvv '{pepov Sipcrev, 
Kai r iSafidcrcraTO cpvXa KaradviqToov dvOpocnrow, 
olavovs re tiuirereas Kai Bripla nrdvra, 
7]fikv oa rjireipos iroXXa. rpecpei t/§' ocra ttovtos, 
Traaiv 5' epya fie/xriXev eixxretpdvov Kv8epeir)S. 
rpiaaas 5' ov tivvarai izemdelu cppevus oi>5' dirarriGai' 
Kovpt\v t alyioxoio Aibs yXavKcomS' 'A6-I}V7]U' 
ov ydp 01 aSev epya iroXvxpvaov 'A(ppodiT7)S, 
aXX' &pu oi iroXe^oi re afiov Kai epyou v Ap7jos 
va/juvai re /xa^cu re, Kai dyXaa spy' aXeyvveiv. 
irpwrrj reKrovas dvdpas ciri}(6oviovs iSiSa^ev 
iroirjaai crarivas re koX dpfxara iro'iKiXa x a ^ K V- 
$) Se re trapQeviKas diraXoxpoas eu fxeydpotaiv 
dyXaa epy' eSida^ev ivi <ppeol 6e7ca eKaarrj. 
ovfih iror 'Apre/xiSa x? V0 " r )^ liaT0V KeXudeiur/v 
SafJ-vurai ev <biXorr}Ti (piXofj.fxei87]S 'Atppotiirrj. 
Kai yap rfj aSe ro\a Kai ovpeai Orjpas evaipeiv, 
<p6p/j.iyy4s re x°P 0i Te tiiairpvcrioi r' oXoXvyal 
aXcred re am6evra SiKatocv re tttoXis dvdp&v. 
ouSe fxev aldo'iy Kovpy adei/ epy' ' A<ppof)irr]S, 
'I(Ttlt], %v TTp(aTT]v reKero YLpovos dyKvXo/j.7]rr]s, 
■noTViav, %v efivSovro UoaeiSdwv ical 'AiroXXcoW 

?l tie 



17G eurip. hip. 

All the burning sun can spy, 
Own the Hunter's witchery; 



5j 8e jxal^ ovk e0eAei/, aAAci (rrepeus airzuirev, 
&fxu<re 5e /xeyav opuov, 6 dy TeTeAecr^eVos iarlu, 
dtyaiJ.ei'r) KecpaXris irarpos Aibs alyioxoio, 
irapBivos eaaeadai iravr' jjfxara, 8?a dedwv. 

Muses ! your sweetest warblings wake 

For golden Aphrodite's sake : 

She o'er the Gods soft love can shed, 

She mortal man controls ; 
And birds and beasts her influence dread, 

And Ocean's scaly shoals. 
At thy bidding- bow they down, 
Goddess of the radiant crown ! 
Three only of the heavenly band 
Can thy persuasive wiles withstand. 

The blue-eyed Pallas, chaste and wise, 
Golden Venus still defies. 

The battle, the rattle 
Of helmet and spear, 

The story of glory 
To her are most dear. 
She taught the smith to frame for war 
The wain and brazen- studded car ; 
And maids, who lend to her attention, 
Learn industry and quick invention. 

And vainly Venus may caress 
The golden arrow's patroness, 
For Dian aye will hear unheeding 
The laughter-loving Goddess pleading. 

The bow, the chace, 

The forest race, 

The harp, the lyre, the dance ; 

The greenwood gay, 

The loud hurra, 

Alone her soul entrance. 



And 



EURIP. HIP. 



All his Paphian mother fear ; 
Empress ! all thy sway revere ! 



And vainly too has Venus smiled 
On Vesta, Saturn's eldest child ; 
To win the modest maiden's love, 
Phoebus and Neptune jointly strove: 
But " No," still " No," fair Vesta said ; 
And, touching Jove's immortal head, 
She swore from wedlock still to fly, 
A maiden live ; a maiden die. 



EURIP. ALC. 447. 



N 2 



ARGUMENT. 



The Chorus, in the following Ode, lament the fate, and 
applaud the generosity, of Alcestis, who had consented 
to die, in order to procure immortality for her husband 
Admetus, King of Pherse. 



EURIP. ALC. 147. 



Farewell to thee ! mid Pluto's halls, 
Where never garish sunbeam falls, 
Still, if my prayers are answered, blest, 
Daughter of Pelias, sweetly rest ! 
And let the God of raven hair 
Own thee the brightest spirit there;. 
Let him, the aged pilot, learn, 
Who, seated in his shallop's stern, 
The pale ghosts, thronging in his bark, 
Ferries o'er Acheron's waters dark, 
Bride half so true his skiff before 
Ne'er wafted to the sable shore. 
Thy praise shall swell to mountain shell, 
And dirges due thy virtues tell ; 
Thy name inspire the minstrel choir, 
The music of the seven-stringed lyre, 
At Sparta, when the circling year 
Brings round the gay Carneian cheer, 



182 



EURIP. ALC. 



Beneath the moon's unwearied light, 
That gladdens through the live -long night ; 
At Athens, where each radiant tower 
Sparkles with Fortune's golden dower ; 
So meet a theme for minstrel's dream 
The story of thy death shall seem. 
Oh ! might I break the fatal chain, 
That links thee to that dim domain, 
And woo thee back to light again ! 
Did no Cocytus interpose, 
Did Hell's tall portals e'er unclose, 
How swiftly should my oar be plied \ 
O'er that dark river's troublous tide ; > 
For thou hast been the truest bride ) 

That time hath ever known : 
No other wife 
Her husband's life 

Hath ransomed with her own. 
Light let them lay the turf above thee, 
And if in death he cease to love thee, 
If e'er he gaze on other charms, 
Or press another in his arms ; 
His children's hate and mine shall be 
Meed of his infidelity. 
No mother's love endured the grave, 
Her child from yawning fate to save, 

No father bore his doom ; 
Though grey their locks, and death drew nigh, 
For him they proffered not to die ; 



EURIP. ALC. 183 



But thou, in life's enchanting spring, 
When all thy charms were blossoming, 

Hast sought, for him, the tomb. 
Be mine a bride as fond, as true, 
Then might I bid life's cares adieu ; 
But scarce on mortal lot may shine 
The blessing of a love like thine. 



EURIP. ALC. 584. 



ARGUMENT, 



Admetus, soon after the death of his wife Alcestis, having 
entertained Hercules, the Chorus, in the following Ode, 
applaud his self-command, and relate his former hospitality 
to Apollo. 



EUR I P. ALC. 584 



Hall of Admetus ! 'neath whose shade 

Ever the pilgrim's form is laid, 

To him thy portals still are free, 

Still proffer hospitality. 

Thy courts to tread, the Pythian king, 

Who deftly strikes the tuneful string, 

In sylvan garb arrayed, 
Forsook his home beyond the sky ; 
A shepherd boy, he loved to hie, 
Piping his pastoral melody, 

Along the winding glade. 
Charmed by the magic of his lay, 
In peace beside their fleecy prey, 

The spotted lynxes stood; 1 



(,) Compare a fragment of Simouides : 

rod /col aireipeaioi 
ttujtcovt' ufjuides virep K€(paAas, ava 5' 
Ix^ves opOol fcvaveov e| v5<xtos aWovro, 
KaXa avv aoida. 

About 



188 EURIP. ALC. 

From Othrys' wood-encircled crown, 
A grisly band, sped trooping down 

Grim lions, smeared with blood. 
The dappled fawn, that harp to hear, 
Came tripping, where the groves of fir 

Hang their green tresses high ; 
With light elastic step she flew, 
And bade the covert shades adieu, 

To list that symphony. 
Restored to heaven, the grateful guest 
His master's flocks with increase blest, 
Whose mansion towers in princely pride, 
Bright Bcebe's limpid lake beside. 
Far stretch his tillage and his plains ; 
The limit to his fair domains 
Lies westward, where the Lord of light 
Stables his steeds in realms of night, 

Molossia's sky beneath ; 
His eastern bound, where Pelion braves 
The fury of JEgean waves, 
Nor friendly creek, nor harbour saves 

The baffled crew from death. 
And now, while yet the tear-drops flow, 
Fresh gushing for his widowed woe, 



About his head flocked many a bird, 
The fish beneath the waters heard, 
And leapt from out the dark blue sea, 
To list the minstrel's melody. 



EURTP. ALC. 189 

Bowed by the stroke of recent ill, 

He bids the stranger welcome still ; 

Still opes his hospitable door, 

As freely as in days of yore. 

For generous souls, whate'er befall, 

Still list to duty's social call ; 

And virtue's sons, in saddest mood, 

Are yet considerate as good. 

Oh ! well I trust rich meed shall be 

From heaven to bless his piety. 



EUR I P. ALC. 983. 



THE ARGUMENT. 

The following Ode is a dirge on Alcestis, addressed to 
Admetus. 



EURIP. ALC. 983. 



Oft my steps have roamed among 

All the airy realms of song, 

Learnt through wisdom's maze to wind, 

Yet availeth not my mind 

Remedy 'gainst Fate to find. 1 

Not all the drugs that Orpheus sage 

Recorded in his Thracian page, 

From her decree can save ; 
Not Phcebus, who the art divine 
Of life-restoring medicine 

To ^Isculapius gave. 



(') Compare Simmias Rhod. 

eyci) yap yevo/xav, dviK inpiv 'AvdyKct, 
Trdvra Se ras 6t«e cppaScuai Kvypals 
epirtTa, iravd' hs' eptrei 
St' aiQpas 

Xaovs T€. 

For I was born when Fate decreed ; 
Fate, to whose gloomy mandates cede 
All beings that existence share, 
From Chaos dark to cloudless Air. 



194 EURIP. ALC. 

Stern Goddess ! at her altar's side 

The votary kneels in vain, 
And vainly clasps her statue's pride, 

And heaps his victims slain. 2 
Oh ! never may she bid me bow 
More lowly to her yoke than now. 
E'en Jove, the everlasting God, 
Whate'er he sanctions by his nod, 
Through her performs, and needs her skill 
To execute his sovereign will : 3 
Her might can bend Chalybian steel, 
Her rugged spirit will not feel. 



( 2 ) A similar sentiment with regard to Death occurs in a frag- 
ment of iEschylus : 

fiopos Qeciv yap ®duaros ov dcipuu tpa., 
ovt $lv ri Ovcdu, oi/V ciricnrevdwv \d&ois' 
ov fiu>p.ds iariv, oiiBe Traiuvifercu. 
fj.6vov 5e Ueidoi} dai^oucoy aizoararei. 

For Death alone, unbending King, 
No altars smoke, no paeans ring; 
And Death alone will neither prize 
Libation, gift, nor sacrifice; 
And Death, of all the Gods, alone, 
Heeds not Persuasion's dulcet tone. 

( 3 ) Compare Chaucer, (Palamon and Arcite, 1665.) 

" The destinee, ministre general, 
That executeth in the world over al 
The purveiance that God hath sen beforne, 
So strong it is, that though the world had sworne 
The contrary of a thing by ya or nay, 
Yet sometime it shall fallen on a day, 
That falleth nat efte in a thousand yere." 



EURIP. ALC. 195 

The fettering clasp 

Of her iron grasp 4 

Its links hath bound 

Thy form around : 
Be patient; — for thy tears are vain, 
They may not wake the dead again ; 5 



( 4 ) Compare Milman, (Martyr of Antioch.) 

" They bind me 
With the hard fetters of their arms." 

( 5 ) This sentiment is prettily expressed, and commented on, in 
the following little poem of Schiller's : 

" Der Eichwald brauset, 
Die wolken ziehn, 
Das Magdlein sitzet 
An Ufer's Griin, 

Es bricht sich die Welle mit Macht, mit Macht, 
Und sie seufzt hinaus in the finstre Nacht, 
Das Auge vom Weinen getriibet. 

u ' Das Herz ist gestorben, 
1 Die Welt ist leer, 
' Und weiter gibt sie 
' Dem Wunsche nichts mehr. 
1 Du Heilige, rufe dein kind zuriick, 
1 Ich habe genossen das irdische Gliick, 
1 Ich habe gelebt und geliebet.' 

" ' Es rinnet der Thranen 
' Vergeblicher Lauf ; 
' Die Klage, sie wecket 
' Die Tod ten nicht auf ; 

' Doch nenne,.was trostet und heilet die Brust, 
' Nach der siissen Liebe verschwundener Lust, 
' Ich, die Himmlische, will's nicht versagen.' 

" ' Lass rinnen der Thranen 
' Vergeblicher Lauf ! 
' Es wecke die Klage 
' Den Todten nicht auf, 
' Das siisseste Gliick fur die tramende Brust, 

o 2 'Nach 



196 EUR1P. ALC. 

E'en heroes, of immortal sire 
And mortal mother born, expire. 6 



' Nach der schbnen Liebe verschwundener Lust, 
' Sind der Liebe Scbmerzen und Klagen.' " 

The clouds are flitting, 

The oak-woods roar, 
And the maiden is sitting 

On Ocean's shore ; 
And the waves of the billowy sea 
Are dashing mightily, mightily ; 
On the murky night floats out her sigh, 
And tears are in her troubled eye. 

" My heart's life has perished, 

" The world is a void, 
" With nought to be cherished, 

" Or wished, or enjoyed. 
" Then, Holy Mother! hear, and call 

" Thy child to her home above ; 
" The cup of bliss, I have drained it all — 

" I have lived ; and lived to love." 
" The tears thou art weeping 

" Stream, maiden, in vain ; 
" Tears woo not the sleeping 

rt To earth back again. 
" But say, what can heal the broken-hearted, 
" When the soft delight of love is parted ; 
" Say, and, if such a balm there be, 
" I will send that balm from above for thee." 

" Let the tears I am weeping 

" Stream on, though in vain ;• 
" True, they woo not the sleeping 

" To earth back again. 
" But the sweetest balm for the broken-hearted, 

" In their dreary waste of years, 
" When the soft delights of love are parted, 

" Is love's lament, and tears !" 

(6) Mention is made by the classical authors of several mortal 
deities ; see, particularly, a curious fragment of Hesiod : 

ivyia 



EUR1P. ALC. 197 

Oh ! she was dear 

While she lingered here, 
She is dear now she rests below ; 

And thou mayst boast 

That the bride thou hast lost 
Was the noblest earth can show. 

We will not look on her burial sod, 

As the cell of sepulchral sleep, 
It shall be as the shrine of a radiant God, 
And the pilgrim shall visit that blest abode, 

To worship, and not to weep. 
And as he turns his steps aside, 

Thus shall he breathe his vow, 
" Here slept a self-devoted bride, 
" Of old to save her lord she died ; 

" She is a spirit now ; 



evvia roi feoei yeueas Aanepvfra KOpwvt], 
avSpwv rific&PTwW eXacpos 8e re rerpaKopavos' 
Tpe?s 8' i\d(povs 6 ic6pa£ yripaffKercu' avrap 6 <poivi£ 
ivvza rovs Kopanas' 8ck<x 8' ^/tcts tovs <po'u>iitus 
vvfitpai iv7rXoKajxoi, Kovpai Alos alyioxoio. 

Nine generations lives the crow, 

As human generations flow ; 

The stag, the years of four crows numbers, 

Ere, spent with age, in death he slumbers ; 

Three stags the raven oft survives ; 

The Phoenix lasts nine ravens' lives : 

But we, whom flowing tresses grace, 

We Nymphs, the Thunderer's mortal race, 

E'en than the aged Phoenix stronger, 

Are blest with lives full ten times longer. 



198 EURIP. ALC. 

" Hail, bright and blest one ! grant to me 
" The smiles of glad prosperity!" 
So shall he own her name divine, 
So bend him at Alcestis' shrine. 






EURIP. EL EC. 480. 



ARGUMENT. 



The following Ode is sung by a Chorus of Argive women, 
after the death of Agamemnon. 



EUR I P. ELEC. 480. 



Glorious fleet ! by countless oars 
Wafted to the Trojan shores, 
In whose wake across the main 
Danced the Nereid's sprightly train, 
While in time, with lute and lyre, 
Moved the Dolphins' darting choir 
Round the purple-beaked prow, 
Fraught with precious freight wert thou. 
Borne by thee to Simoi's banks, 
Agamemnon saw his ranks, 
Deeming Troy already won 
By the might of Thetis' son. 
From Euboea's stormy waters, 
Trooped for him old Nereus' daughters ; 
Arms from Vulcan's forge they brought, 
On the golden anvil wrought. 
Up the steep ascent they hied, 
Ossa's wood and Pelion's side, 



202 EURIP. ELEC. 

Where the prospect wide to spy, 
Listless nymphs in summer lie ; 
Where the ocean Nereid's child 
Roamed with Chiron through the wild, 
Fleet of foot, and framed for war, 
Soon to gleam his country's star. 
Once from wandering man I learned, 
One from Ilion fresh returned, 
When his weary shallop lay, 
Moored in Nauplia's friendly bay, 
All the wondrous forms revealed, 
Son of Thetis, on thy shield, 
Figures at whose lurid glow 
Shook for dread the stoutest foe. 
On the rim, above the deep, 
Seemed with feathered feet to sweep 
Perseus, from successful toils 
Hasting with the Gorgon's spoils, 
With the herald from above, 
Sylvan son of Maia's love. 
In the midst his circle bright 
Kindled Helios, source of light, 
By his winged coursers drawn : 
And the stars that lead till dawn 
Mystic dances through the air, 
Pleiads, Hyads, all were there, 
With their concentrated blaze, 
Blinding Hector's dazzled gaze. 



EURIP. ELEC. 203 

On the golden helm were seen, 
With their prey their claws between, 
Sphynxes, theme of many a dirge. 
On the bossy buckler's verge 
Seemed a lioness to speed, 
Chasing thee, Pirene's steed. 
On the spear, four chargers bounding, 
Dust in clouds their flanks surrounding. 
Yet the warrior, thus arrayed, 
Atreus' princely son obeyed. 
Atreus' son ! where is he now ? 
Broken is thy bridal vow, 
Wedded wife, — by thee he bled ! 
Vengeance hovers o'er thy head : 
Choked with gore shall be thy breath, 
Swift and violent thy death ! 



EUR I P. ELEC. 699, 



ARGUMENT. 



The Chorus relate the following Story to Clytsemnestra, after 
the murder of Agamemnon. 



EUR I P. EL EC. 699. 



There is a tale my mother told ; ! 

The peasant knows it still, 
Who well has conned the legends old 

Of Argos' haunted hill. 

'Tis said that Pan, whose sylvan reed 
Oft echoes down the glade, 

A golden lamb of wondrous breed 
To Atreus' courts conveyed. 



(') The interpretation given by Barnes has been here followed, 
though perhaps the construction of the original more fully war- 
rants the following version : 

'Tis stored among the legends old 

Of Argos' haunted hill, 
That Pan, who loves along the wold 

His sylvan notes to trill, 
Pan, patron of the wax-bound reed, 

To Atreus gave a lamb, 
Of golden fleece and wondrous breed, 

Beside its gentle dam. 



EURIP. ELEC. 

In piercing tone, from steps of stone, 
The herald cried : " Come all, 

" Nor fear to see the prodigy 

" That decks your monarch's stall." 

Then Atreus' kin came trooping in, 

Where gold-wrought shrines were raised ; 

And up and down Mycenae's town 
The kindled altars blazed. 

The pipe, the Muses' willing slave, 

Afar its music flung, 
Responses tuneful voices gave, 

" The golden Lamb " they sung. 

Yet false those shouts that rose to heaven 

Of Atreus' happiness, 
His faithless wife the lamb had given 

Her paramour to bless. 

Thyestes to the forum came, 

And loudly 'gan to call, 
" The lamb of golden fleece I claim, 

" 'Twas placed within my hall." 

Then, then the cars of shining stars 
Were from their courses drawn, 

The sun's fair light was hid in night, 
And veiled the eye of dawn. 



EURIP. ELEC. 209 

The clouds 'gan roll to the Northern Pole, 

So bade the voice of Jove; 
Swift to his rest in the burning West 

The furious Day-God drove. 

And Amnion's seat by the parching heat 

A shrivelled desert grew, 
No drop of rain on the thirsty plain, 

No drop of genial dew. 

I scarce give credence to the tale, 

That yonder glorious Sun 
Would let his golden beams grow pale, 

For aught by mortals done. 

Yet well such tales, what waits the breach 

Of heaven's great laws, record ; 
Thee, high-born Dame, they could not teach, 

For thou hast slain thy Lord. 



EURIP. TROAD. 795. 



p 2 



THE ARGUMENT. 

The Chorus, consisting of Trojan women, lament the capture 
of their city, first by Hercules and Telamon, and afterwards 
by Agamemnon ; and expostulate with Jove and Aurora 
for not having protected them, for the sake of Ganymede 
and Tithonus. 



EURIP. TROAD. 795. 



From Salarainian shore, 
Where waves unwearied roar, 
Where the bee banquets on the flowery down, 
Whence rise those banks to view 
Wliere first the olive grew, 
Minerva's gift, her radiant city's crown, 
Linked with Alcmena's archer-son, 
Went forth to high emprize the princely Telamon. 

He marshalled Graecia's flower 
To storm the Trojan tower ; 
Wroth for his plundered steeds, he sailed the main ; 
His rowers found repose 
Where Simoi's smoothly flows, 
And bound their cables on the Mysian plain ; 
Their leader grasped the shaft and bow, 
That doomed thy heart's best blood, Laomedon, to 
flow. 



214 EURIP. TROAD. 

The forts that Phoebus raised 
In lurid splendour blazed, 
The breath of flame in crimsoned vapors gushed; 
Twice, Troy, thy crashing wall 
Hath tottered to its fall, 
Twice with thy children's blood the spear hath 
blushed ! 
What boots it then, that, borne on high, 
Bright Ganymede fulfils such honoured ministry? 

His delicate steps above 
Glide o'er the courts of Jove, 
His hand in golden cups is nectar pouring, 
While fire consumes on earth 
The land that gave him birth, 
While wail her hollow shores, her fate deploring, 
And, sad as robb'd bird's plaint, the moan 
Is made for matrons grey, for husbands, children 
gone. 

The bath, which saw him lave 
In its translucent wave, 
The courts where he has played are vanished now : 
Yet still unruffled grace 
Beams on his blooming face, 
And calm as summer is his cloudless brow, 
Though Grecian spear hath desolate made 
His haunts of rosy youth, by Priam's sceptre swayed. 



EURIP. TROAD. 215 

Love ! Love ! who, darting down 
To this our Phrygian town, 
Didst woo and win the favourites of heaven, 
By thy auspicious ties, 
Which bound us to the skies, 
What hopes of shielding tenderness were given ! 
Yet both their earthly kindred scorn, 
Alike the Thunder's Lord, the early-waking Morn. 

She, on her silver wings, 
Gladness to mortals brings, 
But marks unpitying this deserted shore; 
Though erst her golden car, 
Studded with many a star, 
Hence to her bower her Dardan bridegroom bore ; 
Yet Ilion sinks, the victor's prey, 
Nor Heaven vouchsafes to aid, nor charms her griefs 
away! 



EURIP. IPH. IN AUL. 1025. 



ARGUMENT. 

Iphigenia, having been enticed to Aulis, where she was to 
be sacrificed, under pretence of being given in marriage to 
Achilles, on her arrival discovers the deception. The 
Chorus, in the following Ode, contrast the splendour which 
attended the bridal of Thetis, with the melancholy fate 
reserved for Iphigenia. 



EUR1P. IPH. IN AUL. 1025. 



Merrily rose the bridal strain, 
With the pipe of reed, and the wild harp ringing, 
With the Libyan flute, and the dancer's train, 
And the bright-haired Muses singing. 

On the turf elastic treading, 
Up Pelion's steep with an airy bound 
Their golden sandals they struck on the ground, 
While the mighty Gods were feasting round, 
As they sped to Peleus' wedding. 
They left Pieria's fountain, 

On the leaf-crowned hill they stood, 
They breathed their softest, sweetest lays 
In the bride's and bridegroom's praise. 
Re-echoed the Centaur's mountain, 
Re-echoed Pelion's wood. 

The golden goblets crowned the Page, 

The Thunderer's darling boy, 
In childhood's rosy age 

Snatched from the plains of Troy. 



220 EURIP. IPH. IN AUL, 

Where on the silvery sand 

The noon-tide sun was glancing, 

The fifty Nereids, hand in hand, 
Were in giddy circles dancing. 

The Centaur's tramp rung up the hill, 

To feast with the Gods they trooped in haste, 
And, at the board by Bacchus graced, 

The purpling bowl to fill. 

Grassy wreath and larch's bough 
Twined around each shaggy brow. 

Daughter of Nereus, loud to thee 
Chaunted the maids of Thessaly. 
Their song was of a child unborn, 
Whose light should beam like summer morn, 
Whose praise by the Delian seer was sung, 
And hymned by Chiron's tuneful tongue. 

" Thetis, mark thy warrior-son, 

" Girt with many a Myrmidon, 

(i Armed with spear and flaming brand, 

" Wasting Priam's ancient land. 

" He shall ne'er to foeman quail ; 

" He shall case his limbs in mail, 

" Casque, and greaves, and breast-plate's fold, 

" All by Vulcan wrought of gold, 

" Moulded in the forge of heaven, 

" By his goddess-mother given. 



EURIP. IPH. IN AUL. 221 

" His shall be a hero's name, 

" Godlike might, and deathless fame." 

Thus the Gods propitious smiled 
On Peleus and the ocean child ; 
Lady ! not such nuptial wreath 

Shall Argives bid thee wear, 
But, with the flowers of death, 

Entwine thy clustering hair. 



EURIP. IPH. IN TAUR. 1059. 



ARGUMENT. 

The following Ode is sung by Grecian women who attended 
Iphigenia, when Priestess of Diana, in the Tauric Cherso- 
nese ; and is occasioned by the prospect of Iphigenia's 
return to Greece without them. 



EURIP. IPH. IN TAUR. 1059. 



Sweet Halcyon ! on the rocky verge 
Of cliffs that hang above the surge, 
Chaunting thy melancholy dirge 1 



(') Compare Moschus, Id. III. 37. 

Ov Toaov elvaXiauri ■nrap' docri jxvparo $e\<plv, 
OvSe roaov ttqk ae/crey iul <TKOireAoi(Tiv ar}5ccv, 
OuSe roaov Oprjvrjaev av' &pea /xuKpci xeAiScbi', 
'AXkvovos 5' ov roaaov in aXyecnv mxe K^i>|, 
Ovdl roaov y\avKO?s evi Kv/J.aai KrjpvKos qSev, 
Ov roaov acaoiaiv ev &yKeai 7ra?8a rbv 'Aovs, 
'lirrd/xevos irepi aw/xa, Kivvparo Mepvovos upvis, 
"Oaaov airocpOi/xevoio KarwSvpavro Bioovos. 

Oh ! ne'er before on Ocean shore 

So loud did dolphin wail, 
Nor in the shade of rocky glade 

So plained the nightingale ; 
Ne'er skimming down the leafy hollow, 
So loudly mourned the twittering swallow : 
Nor Ceyx by the azure sea 
So wept his lost Alcyone. 

Nor diver's cry so mournfully 

E'er rung the wave beside, 
Nor dirge was heard from Memnon's bird 

So sad, when Memnon died ; 

Q When 



226 EURIP. TPH. IN TAUR. 

To the wild waves forlorn, 
Well sympathetic hearts may guess 
What mean those notes of tenderness, 

Thine absent mate they mourn. 2 



When round his body, where he fell, 
She fluttered in the eastern dell, 
As mourned they all on that sad day 
When Bion sighed his soul away. 

( 2 ) See the Story of Ceyx and Alcyone in Ovid's Metamorphoses, 
Lib. II. 725. 

" Jamque propinquse 
Admotum terrae, jam quod cognoscere posset, 
Cernit : erat conjux. Me est, exclamat ; et una 
Ora, comas, vestem lacerat : tendensque trementes 
Ad Ceyca manus. Sic, 6 carissime conjux, 
Sic ad me, miserande, redis 1 ait. Adjacet undis 
Facta manu moles : quae primas aequoris iras 
Frangit ; et incursus quae praedelassat aquarum. 
Insilit hue : mirumque fuit potuisse, volabat ; 
Percutiensque levem modo natis aera pennis, 
Stringebat summas ales miserabilis undas. 
Dumque volat, mcesto similem, plenumque querelae 
Ora dedere sonum tenui crepitantia rostro, 
Ut ver5 tetigit mutum et sine sanguine corpus ; 
Dilectos artus amplexa recentibus alis, 
Frigida nequicquam duro dedit oscula rostro. 
Senserit hoc Ceyx, an vultum motibus undae 
Tollere sit visus, populus dubitabat; at ille 
Senserat. Et tandem, Superis miserantibus, ambo 
Alite mutantur. Fatis obnoxius isdem 
Tunc quoque mansit amor. Nee conjugiale solutum, 
Fcedus in alitibus : coeunt, fiuntque parentes : 
Perque dies placidos hiberno tempore septem 
Incubat Halcyone pendentibus aequore nidis." 

Tossed by the waves, the corpse drew nigh ; 
The well-known form that met her eye 
Confirmed her wild alarms ; 

" 'Tis 



EURIP. IPH. IN TAUR. 227 

Not mine, alas ! thy wafting wing, 
Yet mine thy plaintive strain to sing, 
With memory's fond regrets to cling 



" Tis he," she cried ; — she smote her breast, 
She tore her tresses and her vest, 
She spread her trembling arms. 

" Thus has my love his promise kept!" 
She cried ; upon a dam she leapt, 

That there the waters checked ; 
'Twas built the stormy waves to tire, 
And by sustaining all their ire, 

The harbour to protect. 

As frantic on this dam she springs, 
Wondrous to tell, a pair of wings 

From out her shoulders rise ; 
On novel pinions borne along, 
With darting movement, plaintive song, 

Above the wave she flies. 

And when the Lady tried to speak, 
There issued from her slender beak 

A melancholy strain ; 
And, loth a last embrace to miss, 
On Ceyx' lips to print a kiss 

That beak essayed in vain. 

Some thought that Ceyx raised his head, 
To meet that kiss ;— while others said, 

'Twas but the waves in motion ; 
But Time the infidels refuted, 
For Ceyx, by the Gods recruited, 

Became a bird of ocean, 

Matched with his consort to a feather ; 
And these, so linked in love together, 

Are still a wedded pair ; 
The billows, where they hang their nest, 
For seven long days of winter rest, 

The Halcyon's home to spare. 
Q 2 



228 EURIP. 1PH. IN TAUR. 

To haunts of Graecia still, 
Where Dian, huntress-queen, possesses 

The heights of Cynthus' hill, 
Where towers the palm with feathery tresses, 

And aye the bay 

Each living spray 
With fadeless verdure dresses. 
The olive springs within the brake, 

Apollo's sacred tree, 
The swan is warbling on the lake 

His placid melody; 
Courting the Muses, as he floats, 
To listen to his tuneful notes. 

My tears have streamed, a heavy shower, 

Since hostile spear, in evil hour, 

Laid desolate my native tower. 

They shook the lance, the oar they plied, 

We darted o'er the foaming tide, 

A gold-bought slave, I bowed my pride 

To stand Diana's shrine beside ; 

Nor 1 alone : — of princely blood, 

There too Iphigenia stood, 

Priestess to her whose fatal dart 

Oft quivers in the forest-hart. 

More blest their doom, 
I deem, o'er whom 
Unvarying woes have shed their gloom, 



EURIP. IPII. IN TAUR. ~~9 

Who, from the first, 

In sorrow nurst, 
Are practised to endure the worst ; 
But woe to him, who, left to moan, 
Reviews the hours of brightness gone. 

The Argive shallop o'er the main 
Wafts Agamemnon's child again ; 
The wax-bound reeds Pan loves to fill 
With music on his favourite hill, 
To cheer the rowers on their way, 
Shall trill an airy roundelay. 
Apollo's seven-stringed lyre shall ring; 
Apollo's self the descant sing ; 
And far old Ocean's spray shall fling 

The sailor's dashing oar ; 
The tackle stretched, the tightened sail 
Shall woo the impulse of the gale ; 
And soon the home-bound crew shall hail 

Athena's radiant shore. 
Oh ! might I mount the sunny sky, 
Where Phoebus' fiery coursers fly ! 
Oh ! might the rapid pinions bear 
My form athwart the glistening air, 
Till, where my childhood's hours were past, 
I closed my weary wing at last, 
There joined as once the festal train, 
There wove the merry dance again ! 



230 EURIP. IPH. IN TAUR. 

How happy, by my mother's side, 
When some dear friend became a bride, 
To shine beyond the rest I tried, 

In gay embroidery drest ; 
Vain of my drapery's rich brocade, 
I loved my flowing locks to braid, 
Taught them my blushing cheek to shade, 

And lived, how calmly blest ! 



EUR I P. ION. 8k>. 



ARGUMENT. 



Ion, the son of Apollo, but yet ignorant of his origin, had 
been brought up from infancy in the temple of Delpbi, 
which it was his daily task to keep free from pollution. 
The following Ode is his Morning Song. 



EUR IP. ION. 82. 



Drawn by flaming steeds, the Sun 
Now again the heavens hath won, 
Now again the starry choir, ^ 

Shrinking from his car of fire, > 
To the holy night retire ; J 

Now upon Parnassus' head, 
Where no foot profane may tread, 
Glow his chariot's burning wheels : 
Earth his genial influence feels : 
Phoebus' shrine in vapour dense 
Wraps the kindled frankincense. 
From the tripod's holy seat, 
Hear the Delphian maid repeat, 
Prompted by the unerring seer, 
Strains that thousands press to hear. 



2o4 EUR1P. ION. 

Delphians ! that with Phoebus dwell, 
To Castalia's silvery well 
Speed your limbs at dawn to lave 
In the pure and dewy wave : 
Hushed be each profaner word, 
Let no random voice be heard ; 
Only keep an answer meet 
Pious worshippers to greet. 
I the while my task will ply, 
Task I loved from infancy : 
With the bay unfading crowned, 
Hung with sacred chaplets round, 
Thus I deck the porch and door, 
Sprinkle thus the holy floor ; 
Thus with bow and arrows chase 
From the shrine the feathered race. 
Who my mother, who my sire, 
Vainly might I now enquire ; 
All to filial duty owed 
Give I to this blest abode, 
That its kindly shelter spread 
O'er the houseless orphan's head. 
Come, assist me, fairest spray 
Of the freshly-budding bay, 
Thou, that every speck and stain 
Sweepest from Apollo's fane ; 
In immortal gardens first 
Was thine infant verdure nurst, 



EUKIP. ION. 2o5 

Where the glistening bubbles mount 
From the never-failing fount, 
Whence the sacred myrtle fed, 
Hangs with leafy locks its head ; 
From the pavement day by day 
When I brush the dust away, 
Long as Helios waves his wing, 
Thence a fragrant branch I bring. 
Paean ! Paean ! blest, oh ! blest, 
May Latona's offspring rest ! 
Fairer toil I may not ask 
Than my daily, honoured task ; 
Not to mortal man I bend, 
But on deathless Gods attend. 
Prophet, father, still to thee, 
I a willing slave will be ; 
Earthly parent have I none, 
But I am thy foster-son : 
Paean ! Paean ! blest, oh ! blest, 
May Latona's offspring rest ! 
While this bright bay branch I hold, 
While I pour from cups of gold 
Spangled drops that brightly gleam 
In Castalia's crystal stream ; 
While I keep me free from soil, 
Can I weary of my toil ? 
No : — but if I ever range, 
May I find a blest exchange. 



236 EURIP. ION. 

See from airy slumbers waking, 
Birds Parnassus' heights forsaking, 
Hear my warning, draw not nigh, 
From the precious temple fly, 
Nor your steps presume to set 
On the holy parapet. 
Thou shalt know that I can kill, 
Herald of the Thunderer's will, 
Though thy crooked talons tear 
Every bird that cleaves the air. 
See another sailing on 
Towards the altars ; — 'tis a swan ; 
Ha ! and wilt thou not retreat, 
With thy scarlet-gleaming feet ? 
Though with Phoebus' lyre thy strain 
Concert keep, 'tis all in vain ; 
Hence thy journey, minstrel, take ; 
Launch thee on the Delian lake, 
Lest a shaft transfix thy throat, 
Rife with many a liquid note. 
Ah ! what stranger bird is yonder ? 
Hence ! to distant regions wander : 
Underneath the eaves, I ween, 
Thou thy grass-built nest wouldst screen- 
Dost thou scorn me ? thou shalt know 
How unerring twangs my bow : 
Hie thee to the Isthmian grove, 
Or, within some sheltering cove, 



eur ip. ion. 237 

Rear by Alpheus' stream thy brood. 
Nor on Delphi's shrine intrude. 
I will spare you if I may, 
Ye, who oft to men convey 
Tidings of the Gods above : 
But Apollo claims my love ; 
He from infancy hath fed me, 
He to youth hath safely led me, 
And to him 1 vow to give 
Cheerful service while I live. 



EURIP. CYC. 41. 



ARGUMENT. 

Silenus and his Satyrs, having been shipwrecked on the 
coast of Sicily, became the slaves of the Cyclops Polypheme, 
and were employed by him in keeping his sheep. The 
following is one of their Pastoral Songs. The Cyclops of 
Euripides, from which this Chorus is taken, is the only 
extant specimen of the Satyric Drama, or Farce of the 
Greeks. 



EUR I P. CYC. 41. 



Vain, my sheep, your vaunted breed, 
If you know not where to feed ; 
Not mid those rocks are soft airs blowing, 
Nor there the richest herbage growing ; 
Not there your bleating lambkins call, 
Nor there the gurgling waters fall. 

In your trench, by yonder cave, 
Slake your thirst, your fleeces lave ; 
Or, if ye must wander still, 
Seek at least the dewy hill. 
Must a pebble bring you back, 
Flung across your wilful track ? 
Hie thee, horned one, back again 
To the shepherd Cyclops' den ; 
See, the porter stands before 
His rustic master's rocky door. 
Mothers, hear your sucklings bleating, 
For their evening meal entreating ; 
Penned the live-long day they lie, 
Now give them food and lullaby. 



242 EURIP. CYC. 

Will ye never, never learn 
From the grassy mead to turn ; 
Never rest, when day grows dim, 
In ^Etna's grot each weary limb ? 

But where for me 

The dance, the glee 
Of Bacchus and his maids divine, 

The timbrel's clash, 

The fountain's flash, 
The enlivening cups of wine ? 

Nyssa's hill is far away, 

Here no nymphs at twilight play, 

Yet still the Bacchanalian lay 

I chaunt to beauty's Queen. 
How oft, her witching smiles to gain, 

I've sought each hallowed scene, 
Where lovely played the Bacchant train, 
Or swept with snowy feet the plain ! 

Say, Bacchus, say where thou, 
Sequestered, wanderest now, 

Thy golden tresses floating on the gale ? 

Reft of defence, if thy protection fail, 
Clad in this shaggy coat, 
Snatched from the grim he-goat, 
Drudge of the one-eyed Cyclops, see 
Forlorn thy favourite votary ! 



ARIST. AV. 1058. 



ARGUMENT 



The following Ode is supposed to be sung by a Chorus 
of birds. 



ARIST. AV. 1058. 



If the race of men are wise, 
Soon to us they'll sacrifice, 
Soon before us suppliant fall, 
For we glance and rule o'er all. 
When I sail the sky, my gaze 
Every nook beneath surveys ; 
When to earth from heaven I shoot, 
I am guardian of the fruit; 
Foe of every glutton worm 
Feasting on the tender germ, 
Or on trees, with budlets swelling, 
Finding both his food and dwelling. 
All that mar the garden's sweets, 
I pursue to their retreats ; 
All that creep, and all that sting, 
Shudder when they hear my wing ; 
They, by tiny talons slain, 
Ne'er shall slime the flowers again, 
Storm may beat, or sun may shine, 
Happy, happy life is mine. 



-i*' ARIST. A\. 

From the biting winter's cold 
Swathed not in the mantle's fold. 
Scorched not by the piercing ray 
Of the sultry, summer day, 
Mid the flowery meads I wrap me, 
Where the cradling leaflets lap me : 
Thus the glowing heat I shun, 
'When, enthusiast of the sun, 
Taught by heaven his shrilly tune, 
Wakes the insect bard of noon. 
When the frost I cannot bide, 
In the sheltering grot I hide, 
There, through gloomy winter, gay, 
Mid the mountain nymphs I play ; 
With the balmy breath of spring, 
With the myrtle's blossoming, 
Straight to feast I speed my flight 
On its buds of virgin white, 
Or on sweets of perfumed flower-. 
Culled amid the Graces' bower-. 



THE END. 



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